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THE LIFE STORY OF 
EDGAR ALLAN POE 



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The Dreamer 



A ROMANTIC RENDERING 
OF THE LIFE- STORY OF 
EDGAR ALLAN POE 

BY 

MARY NEWTON STANARD 

(Author of "The Story of Bacon's Rebellion") 



m 



"They who dream by day are 

cognizant of many things which 

escape those who dream only by 

night. In their gray visions they 

obtain glimpses of eternity, and 

thrill, in waking, to find they have 

been upon the verge of the great 

secret." 

—Edgar Allan Poe, in ''Eleanora'' 



RICHMOND. VIRGINIA 

THE BELL BOOK AND STATIONERY COMPANY 

1909 



COPYRIGHT 1909 
BY MARY NEWTON STANARD 







jTlBRARY of CONGRESS 
1 Two CoDies Received 

JUN 19 ik»0» 

Copyriirnt EntU' q 

w^ /// n^ 7 

' COPY o. 



210 tiit S^utvth Mttni^vyi 
of 



TO THE READER 



This study of Edgar Allan Poe^, poet and man, is 
simply an attempt to make something like a finished 
picture of the shadowy sketch the biographers, hampered 
by the limitations of proved fact, must, at best, give us. 

To this end I have used the story-teller's license to 
present the facts in picturesque form. Yet I believe 
I have told a true story — true to the spirit if not to 
the letter — for I think I have made Poe and the other 
persons of the drama do nothing they may not have 
done, say nothing they may not have said, feel nothing 
they may not have felt. In many instances the opinions, 
and even the words I have placed in Poe's mouth are 
his own — found in his published works or his letters. 

I owe much, of course, to the writers of Poe books 
before and up to my time. Among these, I would make 
especial and grateful acknowledgment to Mr. J. H. 
Ingram, Professor George E. Woodberry, Professor 
James A. Harrison and Mrs. Susan Archer Weiss. 

But more than to any one of his biographers, I am 
indebted to Poe himself for the revelations of his per- 
sonality which appear in his own stories and poems, the 
most part of which are clearly autobiographic. 

M. N. S. 



THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER I. 



The last roses of the year 1811 were in bloom in the 
Eichmond gardens and their petals would soon be scat- 
tered broadcast by the winds which had already stripped 
the trees and left them standing naked against the cold 

sky- 
Cold indeed, it looked, through the small, smoky 
window, to the eyes of the young and beautiful woman 
who lay dying of hectic fever in a dark, musty room 
back of the shop of Mrs. Fipps, the milliner, in lower 
Main Street — cold and friendless and drear. 

She was still beautiful, though the sparkle in the 
great eyes fixed upon the bleak sky had given place to 
deep melancholy and her face was pinched and wan. 

She knew that she was dying. Meanwhile, her appear- 
ance as leading lady of Mr. Placide's company of high 
class players was flauntingly announced by newspaper 
and bill-board. 

The advertisement had put society in a flutter; for 
Elizabeth Arnold Poe was a favorite with the public 
not only for her graces of person and personality, her 
charming acting, singing and dancing, but she had that 
incalculable advantage for an actress— an appealing life- 
story. It was known that she had lately lost a dearly 



8 THE DREAMER 

loved and loving husband whom she had tenderly nursed 
through a distressing illness. It was also known that 
the husband had been a descendant of a proud old 
family and that the same high spirit which had led his 
grandfather^ General Poe^ passionately denouncing Brit- 
ish tyranny, to join the Eevolutionary Army, had, tak- 
ing a different turn with the grandson, made him for 
the sake of the gifted daughter of old England who had 
captured his heart — actress though she was — sever home 
ties, abandon the career chosen for him by his parents, 
and devote himself to the profession of which she was a 
chief ornament. A brief five years of idylic happiness 
the pair had spent together — ^happiness in spite of much 
work and some tears; — then David Poe had succumbed 
to consumption, leaving a penniless widow with three 
bhildren to support. The eldest, a boy, was adopted by 
his father's relatives in Baltimore. The other two — a 
boy of three years in whom were blended the spirit, the 
beauty, the talent and the ardent nature of both parents, 
and a soft-eyed, cooing baby girl — were clinging about 
their mother whenever she was seen off the stage, mak- 
ing a picture that was the admiration of all beholders. 

The last roses of the ^-ear would soon be gone from 
the gardens, but Mrs. Fipps' windovv^s blossomed gal- 
lantly with garlands and sprays more wonderful than 
any that ever grew on tree or shrub. ISTot for many 
a long day had the shop enjoyed such a thriving trade, 
for no sooner had the news that Mr. Placide's com- 
pany would open a season at the theatre been noised 
abroad than the town beaux addressed themselves 
to the task of penning elegant little notes inviting the 



THE DREAMER 9 

town. belles to accompany them to the play, while the 
belles themselves, scenting an opportunity to complete 
the wreck of masculine hearts that was their chief busi- 
ness, addressed themselves as promptly to the quest of 
the most ravishing theatre bonnets which the latest 
Paris fashions as interpreted by Mrs. Fipps could pro- 
duce. As that lady bustled back and forth among her 
customers, her mouth full of pins and hands full of 
ribbons, feathers, flowers and what not, her face wore, 
in spite of her prosperity, an expression of unusual 
gravity. 

She could not get the lodger in the hack room off her 
mind. 

Mr. Placide, who had been to see the sick woman, 
was confident that her disorder was "nothing serious," 
and that she would be able to meet her engagements, 
and charged the thrifty dealer in fashionable head-gear 
and furnished rooms by no means to let the fact that 
the star was ill "get out.'' But the fever-flush that 
tinged the patient's pale cheeks and the cough that 
racked her wasted frame seemed very like danger signals 
to good Mrs. Fipps, and though she did not realize the 
hopelessness of the case, her spirits were oppressed by a 
heaviness that would not be shaken off. 

Ill as Mrs. Poe, or Miss Arnold, as she was still some- 
times called, was, she had managed by a mighty effort 
of will and the aid of stimulants to appear once or 
twice before the footlights. But her acting had been 
spiritless and her voice weak and it finally became neces- 
sary for the manager to explain that she was suffering 
from "chills and fevers," from which he hoped rest and 



10 THE DREAMER 

skillful treatment would relieve her and make it pos- 
sible for her to take her usual place. But she did not 
appear. Gradually her true condition became generally- 
known and in the hearts of a kindly public disappoint- 
ment gave place to sympathy. Some of the most chari- 
tably disposed among the citizens visited her, bringing 
comforts and delicacies for her and presents for the 
pretty, innocent babes who all unconscious of the cloud 
that hung over them, played happily upon the floor of 
the dark and bare room in which their mother's life 
was burning out. iSTurse Betty, an ample, motherly 
soul, with cheeks like winter apples and eyes like blue 
china, and a huge ruffled cap hiding her straggly grey 
locks from view — versatile Betty, who was not only 
nurse for the children and lady's maid for the star, but 
upon occasion appeared in small parts herself, hovered 
about the bed and ministered to her dying mistress. 

As the hours and days dragged by the patient grew 
steadily weaker and weaker. She seldom spoke, but 
lay quite silent and still save when shaken by the tor- 
turing cough. On a Sunday morning early in Decem- 
ber she lay thus motionless, but wide-eyed, listening to 
the sounds of the church-bells that broke the quiet air. 
As the voice of the last bell died away she stirred and 
requested, in faint accents, that a packet from the bot- 
tom of her trunk be brought to her. When this was 
done she asked for the children, and when Nurse Betty 
brought them to the bedside she gave into the hands of 
the wondering boy a miniature of herself, upon the 
back of which was written: "For my dear little son 
Edgar, from his mother," and a small bundle of letters 



THE DREAMER 11 

tied with blue ribbon. She clasped the baby fingers of 
the girl about an enameled jewel-case, of artistic work- 
manship, but empty, for its contents had, alas, gone to 
pay for food. She then motioned that the little ones 
be raised up and allowed to kiss her, after which, a 
frail, white hand fluttered to the sunny head of each, 
as she murmured a few words of blessing, then with 
a gentle sigh, closed her eyes in her last, long sleep. 

The baby girl began to whimper with fright at the 
suddenness with which she was snatched up and borne 
from the room, and the boy looked with awe into the 
face of the weeping nurse who, holding his sister in 
one arm dragged him away from the bedside and out 
of the door, by the hand. There was much hurried 
tramping to and fro, opening and closing of doors and 
drawing to of window-blinds. These unusual sounds 
filled the boy with a vague fear. 

That night the children were put to bed upon a 
pallet in Mrs. Fipps' own room and Mrs. Fipps her- 
self rocked the baby Rosalie to sleep and gave the little 
Edgar tea-cakes, in addition to his bread and milk, 
and told him stories of Heaven and beautiful angels 
playing upon golden harps. The next day the children 
were taken back to their mother's room. The shutter 
to the window which let in the one patch of dim light 
was now closed and the room was quite dark, save for 
two candles that stood upon stands, one at the foot, 
the other at the head of the bed. The air was heavy — 
sickening almost — with the odor of flowers. Upon the 
bed, all dressed in white, and with a wreath of wliite 
roses on her dark ringlets, lay their mother, with eye- 



12 THE DREAMER 

lids fast shut and a lovely smile on her lips. She was 
very white and very beautiful, but when her little boy 
kissed her the pale lips were cold on his rosy ones, as 
if the smile had frozen there. It was very beautiful 
but the boy was a little frightened. 

" Mother — " he said softly, pleadingly, " Wake up ! 
I want you to wake up.'' 

The weeping nurse placed her arm around him and 
knelt beside the bed. 

^^ She will never wake up again here on earth, Eddie 
darling. Never — nevermore. She has gone to live with 
the angels where you will be with her some day, but 
never — nevermore on earth.'' 

With that she fell to weeping bitterly, hiding her 
face on his little shoulder. 

The child, marvelling, softly repeated, " Nevermore — 
nevermore." The solemn, musical word, with the pic- 
ture in the dim light, of the sleeping figure — asleep to 
wake nevermore — and so white, so white, all save the 
dusky curls, sank deep into his young mind and mem- 
ory. His great grey eyes were wistful with the beauty, 
and the sadness, and the mystery of it all. 

The next day the boy rode in a carriage with Mrs. 
Fipps and Nurse Betty who had left off the big white 
cap and was enveloped from head to foot in black, up 
a long hill, to a white church in a churchyard where 
the grass was still green between the tombstones. The 
bell in the white steeple was tolling slowly, solemnly. 
Soft grey clouds hung over the steeple and snow-flakes 
as big as rose-leaves began to fill the air. Presently the 
bell ceased tolling and he and Nurse Betty moved up 



THE DREAMER 13 

the aisle behind a train of figures in black, with black 
streamers floating from their sleeves. The figures bent 
beneath a heavy burden. It was long and black and 
grim, but the flowers that covered it were snow-white 
and filled the church with a sweet smell. A white- 
robed figure led the way up the aisle, repeating, as he 
walked, some words so solemn and full of melody that 
they sounded almost like music. The church was dim, 
and quiet, and nearly empty. The organ began to 
play — oh, so softly! It was very beautiful, but still 
the boy shuddered, for he dimly realized that the grim 
box held the sleeping form that seemed to be his 
mother, but was not his real mother. Her kisses were 
not frozen, and she was in Heaven with the angels. 

The choir sang sweet music and the white-robed 
priest said more solemn words that were like spoken 
music; then the procession moved slowly down the 
aisle again and out of the door. The bell in the steeple 
was silent now, and the organ was silent'. Silently the 
procession moved — silently the snow came down. Sil- 
ently and softly, like white flowers. The green graves 
were white with it now, like the flowers on the coffin 
lid; but the open grave in the church-yard corner, near 
the wall — it was dark, and deep and terrible! The 
boy's heart almost stood still as, clinging to Nurse 
Betty's hand, he stared into its yawning mouth. He 
felt that he would choke— would suffocate. They were 
lowering the box into that deep, dark pit! What if 
the sleeping figure should awake, after all — awake to 
the darkness and narrowness of that narrow bed! 

With a piercing shriek the child broke from his 



14 THE DREAMER 

nurse's hand and thrust himself upon the arm of one 
of the black figures who held the ropes, in a wild effort 
to stay him; then, still shrieking, was borne from the 
spot. 



TEE DREAMER 15 



CHAPTER II. 



" Since it seems you have set your heait upon this 
thing, I do not forbid it ; but remember, you are acting 
in direct opposition to my judgment and advice, and 
if you ever live to regret it (as I believe you shall) 
you will have no one but' yourself to blame." 

John Allan's voice was harsher, more positive, than 
usual; his shoulders seemed to square themselves and 
a frowning brow hardened an always austere face. His 
whole manner was that of a man consenting against 
his will. His young wife hung over his chair vainly 
endeavoring to smooth, with little pats of her fair 
hands, the stubborn locks that would stand on end, 
like the bristles of a brush, whatever she did. Her 
soft and vivacious beauty was in striking contrast to 
the strength and severity of his rugged and at the 
same time distinguished countenance. His narrow, 
steel-blue eyes, deep sunk under bushy brows and a 
high, but narrow, forehead, were shrewd and piercing; 
his nose was large and like a hawk's beak. His^ face 
too, was narrow, with cheek-bones high as an Indian's. 
His mouth was large, but firmly closed, and the chin 
below it was long and prominent and was carried stiffly 
above the high stock and immaculate, starched shirt- 
ruffles. Her figure, as she leaned against the chair's 
high back, was slender and girlish,— childish, almost^, 
in'^its low-necked, short-waisted, slim-skirted, "Em- 
pire" dress, of some filmy stuff, the pale yellow of a 



16 THE DREAMER 

Marshal Niel rose. Her face was a pure oval with 
delicate, regular features. Her reddish-brown hair, 
parted in the middle, was piled on top of her small 
head, and airy little curls hung down on her brow on 
either side of the part. Her eyes — the color of her 
hair — were gentle and sweet and her mouth was ten- 
derly curved and rosy. With her imploring attitude, 
the sweetness of her eyes and mouth and the warmth 
of her plea, her fresh beauty glowed like a flower, 
newly opened. All unmoved, John Allan repeated, 

" You will have no one but yourself to blame." 

Her ardor undimmed by the chariness of the con- 
sent she had gained, she showered the lowering brow 
with cool, delicate little kisses until it grew smooth in 
spite of itself. 

" Oh, I know I never shall regret it, John," she 
cooed. " He is such a beautiful boy — so sweet and 
affectionate, so merry and clever! Just what I should 
like our own little boy to be, John, if God had blessed 
us with one." 

" I grant you he seems a bonny little lad enough, 
Frances. But I realize, as it seems you do not, the 
risk of undertaking to rear as your own the child of 
any but the most unquestionable parentage. I confess 
the thought of introducing into my family the son of 
professional players is extremely distasteful to me." 

"But John, dear, you know these Poes were not 
ordinary players. The father was one of the Mary- 
land Poes and I understand the mother came of good 
English stock. She certainly seemed to be a lady and 
a good, sweet woman, poor thing! The Mackenzies 



THE DREAMER 17 

have decided to adopt the baby Eosalie, though they 
have children, as you know; and with this charming 
little Edgar for my very own I shall be the happiest 
woman alive." 

"Well, well, keep your pretty little pet, but if he 
turns out to be other than a credit to you, don't forget 
that you were warned." 

And so the little Edgar Poe — the players' child — 
became Edgar Allan, with a fond and admiring young 
mother who became at once and forever his slave and 
whose chief object in life henceforth was to stand be- 
tween him and the discipline of a not intentionally 
harsh or unkind, but strict and uncompromising father ; 
who though he too, was fond of the boy, in a way, and 
proud of his beauty and little accomplishments, was 
constantl}^ on the lookout for the cloven foot which his 
fixed prejudice against the child's parentage made him 
certain would appear. 

In her delight over her acquisition, Frances Allan 
was like a child with a new toy. She almost smoth- 
ered him with kisses when, accepting her bribe of a 
spaniel pup and his pockets full of sugar-kisses, he 
agreed to call her " Mother." With her own fingers she 
made him the quaintest little baggy trousers, of silk 
pongee, and a velvet jacket, and a tucker of the finest 
linen. His cheap cotton stockings were discarded for 
scarlet silk ones, and for his head, "sunny over with 
curls" of bright nut-brown, she bought from Mrs. 
Fipps, the prettiest peaked cap of purple velvet, with a 
handsome gold tassel that fell gracefully over on one 



18 THE DREAMER 

shoulder. Thus arrayed, she took him about town with 
her to show him to her friends who were ecstatic in 
their admiration of his pensive, clear-cut features, his 
big, grey eyes and his nut-brown ringlets; of his 
charming smile and the frank, pretty manner in which 
he gave his small hand in greeting. 

" Oh, but you should hear him recite and sing, the 
proud foster-mother would say. " And he can dance, 
too.^' 

She gave a large dinner-party just to exhibit the 
accomplishments of her treasure — actually standing him 
upon the table when it had been cleared, to sing and 
recite for the guests. Even her husband unbent so 
far as to applaud vigorously the modest, yet self- 
possessed grace with which the mite drank the healths 
of the assembled company — making a neat little speech 
that his new mother had taught him. 

The boy's young heart responded to the affection of 
the foster-mother to a certain degree; but, mere baby 
though he was, his real heart lay deep in the grave on 
the hill-top, where the earthly part of that other mother 
was lying so still, so white, with the roses on her hair 
and the frozen smile on her lips. 

The churchyard on the hill was but a short distance 
away from his new home, and as spring opened, became 
a favorite resort of nurses and children. The negro 
^^ mammy " who had replaced Nurse Betty used often 
to take him there, and often, as she chatted with other 
mammies, her charge would wander from her side to 
the grave against the wall, where he would stretch his 
small body full length upon the turf and whisper the 



TEE DREAMER 19 

thoughts of his infant mind to the dear one below; for 
who knew but that^ even down under ground she might 
be glad to hear, through her Avhite sleep, her little boy's 
words of love and remembrance — though never, never- 
more she could see him on earth. He would even imag- 
ine her replies to him, until the conversations with her 
became so real that he half believed they were true. 

At night, when bed-time came, he said his prayers 
at the knee of his pretty new mother, who told him 
jolly stories and sang him jolly songs, and patted him 
and soothed him with caresses which he found very 
agreeable, and accepted graciously. But he always took 
the miniature which had been his dying mother's part- 
ing gift to bed with him and he was glad when the new 
mother kissed him goodnight and put out the light and 
softly closed the door behind her; for it was then, 
v^ith the picture close against his breast, that the visions 
came to him — the visions of angels making sweet music 
upon golden harps and among them his lost mother, 
with her sweet face saddened but made sweeter still 
by that thought of nevermore. 

Oh, that wondrous word nevermore! Its music 
charmed him, its hopelessness filled and thrilled him 
with a strange, a holy sorrow, in which there was no 
pain. 

With the lovely vision still about him, the picture 
still clasped to his breast, he would sink into healthful 
sleep to wake on the morrow a bright, joyous boy, 
alive to all the pleasures of the new day— delighting in 
the beauties of blue sky and sunshine, of whispering 
tree and opening flower, ready for sport with his play- 



20 THE DREAMER 

fellows and his pets, and full of all manner of merry- 
pranks and jokes. For in the frame of this small boy- 
there dwelt two distinct personalities — ^twin brothers — 
yet as utterly unlike as strangers and foreigners, think- 
ing different thoughts, speaking different languages, 
and dominating him — spirit and body — by turns. One 
of these we will call Edgar Goodfellow — Edgar the gay, 
the laughter-loving, the daring, the real, live, whole- 
some, normal boy; keen for the society of other boys 
and liking to dance, to run, to jump, to climb, even to 
fight. The other, Edgar the Dreamer, fond of solitude 
and silence and darkness, for they aided him to wander 
far away from the everyday world to one of make 
believe created by himself and filled with beings to 
whom real people were but as empty shadows; but a 
world that the death and burial of his beautiful and 
adored young mother and the impression made upon 
him by those scenes, had tinged with an eternal sadness 
which hung over it as a veil. 

The life of Edgar the Dreamer was filled with the 
subtle charm of mystery. It was a secret life. The 
world in which he moved was a secret world — an in- 
visible world, to whose invisible door he alone held 
the key. Edgar the Dreamer was himself an invisible 
person, for the only outward difference between him 
and his twin brother, Edgar Goodfellow, lay in a cer- 
tain quiet, listless air and the solemn look in his big, 
dark grey eyes which his playmates — bored and intol- 
erant' — took as indications that " Edgar was in one of 
his moods,'' and his foster-father — eyeing him keenly 



THE DREAMER 21 

and with marked displeasure — as an equally unmistak- 
able indication that he was " hatching mischief." 

There were times when in the midst of the liveliest 
company this so-called "mood" would possess the 
child. He would fall silent; his mouth would become 
pensive, his dark grey eyes would seem to be impene- 
trably veiled; his chin would drop upon his hand; he 
would seem utterly forgetful of his surroundings. The 
familiar Edgar — Edgar Goodfellow — would have 
given place to Edgar the Dreamer, who though appa- 
rently of the company, would really have slipped 
through that invisible portal and wandered far afield 
v/ith the playmates of his fancy. 

At such times Mrs. Allan would say, " Eddie, what 
are you thinking about ? " And brought back to her 
world with a jolt, the boy would answer quickly (some- 
what guiltily it seemed to Mr. Allan — noting the 
startled expression), 

"Nothing." It was his first lie, and a very little 
one, but one that was often repeated ; for he that would 
guard a secret must be used to practice deception. 

Mr. Allan would say, " Wake up, wake up, child ! 
Only the idle sit and stare at nothing and think of 
nothing. Youll be growing up an idle, trifling boy if 
you give way to such a habit." 

Between the Allans and Edgar the Dreamer a great 
gulf lay — for how should a dreamer of day-dreams re- 
veal himself to any not of his own tribe and kind? 
Upon Edgar Goodfellow Mrs. Allan doted. All of her 
friends agreed with her that so remarkable a child- 
one so precocious and still so attractive — had never 



22 THE DREAMER 

been seen, and Mr. Allan was secretly, as proud of his 
wrestling, running, riding and other ont-door triumphs 
as his wife was of his pretty parlor accomplishments. 
Their friends agreed too, that she made him the best 
of mothers, barring the fact (for which weakness she 
was excusable — he was such a love ! ) that she spoiled 
him, and perhaps permitted him to rule her too abso- 
lutely. Was he grateful? Oh, well, that would come 
in time. Appreciation was not a quality to be expected 
in children, and what more natural than that the boy 
should accept as a matter of course the good things 
which she made plain it was her chief pleasure in life 
to shower upon him ? She was indeed, as good a mother 
as it was possible for a mother without a highly devel- 
oped imagination to be. 

A most lovely woman was Frances Allan, justly ad- 
mired and liked by all who knew her. She was pretty 
and gracious and sunny-tempered and sweet-natured ; 
charitable — both to society and the poor — and faithful 
to her religious duties. Withal, a notable house-keeper, 
given to hospitality, fond of " company " and gifted in 
the art of making her friends feel at home under her 
roof. If she was not gifted with a lively imagination 
she did not know it, and so had not missed it. As Mr. 
Allan's wife she had not needed it. And so she lav- 
ished upon Edgar Goodfellow everything that heart 
could wish. She delighted to provide him with pets 
and toys and good things to eat, and to fill his little 
pockets with money for him to spend upon himself or 
upon treating his friends. Fortunately, the other 



TEE DREAMER 23 

Edgar — Edgar the Dreamer — was not dependent upon 
her for his pleasures, for the beauties of sky and river 
and garden and wood which nourished his soul were 
within his own reach. 

If Mrs. Allan had known Edgar the Dreamer, she 
would have been puzzled and alarmed. If Mr. Allan 
had known him he would have been angry. A man of 
action was John Allan. A canny Scotchman he, who 
ow^ed his success as a tobacco merchant to energy and 
strict attention to business. If there were dreams in 
the bowl of the pipe, there was no room for them in the 
counting-house of a thrifty dealer in the weed. Medi- 
tation had no part in his life— was left out of his 
composition. He believed in doing. Day-dreaming was 
in his opinion but another name for idling, and idling 
was sin. 

The son of their adoption vaguely realized the lack 
of kinship — the impossibility of contact between his 
nature and theirs, and as time went on drew more and 
more within himself. The life of Edgar the Dreamer 
became more and more secret. So often however, did 
the warning against his idle habit fall upon his ears 
that the plastic conscience of childhood made note of 
it — confusing the will of a blind human guardian wdth 
that of God. The Eden of his dreams, guarded by the 
flaming sword of his foster-father's wrath, began to 
assume the aspect (because by parental command denied 
him) of an evil place — though none the less sweet to 
his soul — and it was with a consciousness of guilt that 
he would steal in and wander there. 

Thus the habit that nurtured God-given genius, 



24: THE DREAMER 

branded as sin, and forbidden, might have been broken 
up, altogether or in part, had not the special providence 
that looks after the development of this rare exotic 
transplanted it to a more fertile soil — a more congenial 
clime. 



THE DREAMER 25 



CHAPTER III. 



Upon a mellow September afternoon three years after 
the newspapers had announced the death, in Richmond, 
Virginia, of Elizabeth Arnold, the popular English 
actress, generally known in the United States as Mrs. 
Poe, the ancient town of Stoke-Newington, in the 
suburbs of London, dozing in the shadows of its imme- 
morial elms, was aroused to a mild degree of activity 
by the appearance upon its green-arched streets of three 
strangers — evidently Americans. It was not so much 
their nationality as a certain distinguished air that drew 
attention upon the dignified and proper gentleman in 
broadcloth and immaculate linen, the pretty, gracious- 
seeming and fashionably dressed lady and especially the 
little boy of six or seven summers with the large, wist- 
ful eyes and pale complexion, and chestnut ringlets 
framing a prominent, white brow and tumbling over a 
broad, snowy tucker. He wore pongee knickerbockers 
and red silk stockings and on his curls jauntily rested 
a peaked velvet cap from which a heavy gold tassel fell 
over upon his shoulder. 

The denizens of old Stoke-Newington gazed upon this 
prosperous trio with frank curiosity; the reader has al- 
ready recognized John Allan and his wife, Frances, and 
little Edgar Poe — their adopted child. 

The sun was still hot, and the refreshing chill in the 
dusky street, under its arch of interlacing boughs, was 
grateful to the 'tired little traveller. As he moved 



26 THE DREAMER 

along, clinging to Mrs. Allan's hand, his big eyes 
gazing as far as they might up the long, cool aisle the 
trees made, the hazy green distance invited his mystery- 
loving fancy. The odors of a thousand flowering shrub- 
beries were on the air and he felt that it was good to 
be in this dreaming old town — as old, it seemed to 
him, as the world; and there was born in him at that 
moment, though he could not have defined it, a sense of 
the picturesquesness, the charm, the fragrance, of old 
things — old streets, old houses, old trees, old turf and 
shrubberies, even — with their haunting suggestions of 
bygone days and scenes. 

They passed the ancient Gothic church, standing sol- 
emn and serene among its mossy tombs. In the misty 
blue atmosphere above the elms the fretted steeple 
seemed to the boy to lie imbedded and asleep, but even 
ay he gazed upon it the churchbell, sounding the hour, 
broke the stillness with a deep, hollow roar which 
thrilled him with mingled awe and delight. 

Ah, here indeed, was a place made for dreaming ! 

In the midst of the town lay the Manor House 
School where the scholarly Dr. Bransby, who preached 
in the Gothic church on Sundays, upon week-days in- 
structed boys in various branches of polite learning — 
and also frequently flogged them. This school was the 
destination of the three strangers from America, for 
here the foundations of young Edgar's education were 
to be laid during the several years residence of his 
foster-parents in London, in which city the boy himself 
would pass his holidays and sometimes be permitted to 
spend week-ends. 



THE DREAMER 27 

The ample grounds of the school were enclosed from 
the rest of the town by a high and thick brick wall, 
dingy with years, which seemed to frown like a prison 
wall upon the grassy and pleasantly shaded freedom 
without. At one corner of this ponderous wall was set 
a more ponderous gate, riveted and studded with iron 
bolts, and surmounted with jagged iron spikes. As 
the boy passed through it he trembled with delicious 
awe which was deepened by the ominous creak of the 
mighty hinges. He fancied himself entering upon a 
domain of mystery and adventure where all manner of 
grim and unearthly monsters might cross his pathway 
to be wrestled with and destroyed. The path to the 
house lay through a small parterre planted with box 
and other shrubs, and beyond stretched the playgrounds. 

As for the house itself, that appeared to the eyes of 
the boy as a veritable palace of enchantment. It was 
a large, grey, rambling structure of the Elizabethan 
age. Within, it was like a labyrinth. Edgar wondered 
if there were any end to its windings and incompre- 
hensible divisions and sub-divisions — to its narrow, 
dusky passages and its steps down and up — up and 
down; to its odd and unexpected nooks and comers. 
Scarce two rooms seemed to him to be upon the same 
level and between continually going down or up three 
or four steps in a journey through the mansion upon 
which Dr. Bransby guided him and his foster-parents, 
the dazed little boy found it almost impossible to de- 
termine upon which of the two main floors he hap- 
pened to be. It was afterward to become a source of 
secret satisfaction to him that he never finally decided 



28 THE DREAMER 

upon which floor was the dim sleeping apartment to 
which he was introduced soon after supper, and which 
he shared with eighteen or twenty other boys. 

The business of formally entering the pupil about 
whom the Allans and Dr. Bransby had already cor- 
responded, in the school, was soon dispatched, and once 
more the iron gate swung open upon its weirdly com- 
plaining hinges, then went to again with a bang and a 
clang, and the little boy from far Virginia, with the 
wistful grey eyes and the sunny curls was alone in a 
throng of curious school-fellows, and in the dimness, 
the strangeness, the vastness of a hoary, mysterious 
mansion full of echoes, and of quaint crannies and 
closets where shadows lurked by day as well as by 
candle-light. Alone, yet not unhappy — for Edgar the 
Dreamer was holding full sway. With the departure 
of his foster-father, all check was removed from his 
fancy which could, and did, run riot in this creepy and 
fascinating old place, and at night he had to comfort 
him the miniature of his mother from which he had 
■never been parted for an hour, and which he still car- 
ried to bed with him with unfailing regularity. 

He had always known that his mother was English- 
born, and somehow, in his mind, there seemed to be 
some mystic connection between this ancient town and 
manor house and the green graveyard in Eichmond, 
with its mouldy tombstones and encompassing wall. 

Not until the next morning was the new pupil ushered 
into the school-room — the largest room in the world 
it seemed to the small, lonely stranger. It was long, 



THE DREAMER 29 

narrow and low-pitched. Its ceiling was of oak, black 
with age, and the daylight struggled fitfully in through 
pointed, Gothic windows. Built into a remote and 
terror-inspiring corner was a box-like enclosure, eight 
or ten feet high, of heavy oak, like the ceiling, with a 
massy door of the same sombre wood. This, the new- 
comer soon learned was the "sanctum" of the head- 
master — the Rev. Dr. Bransby — whose sour visage, 
snuffy habiliments and upraised ferule seemed so ter- 
rible to young Edgar that on the following Sunday 
when he went to service in the Gothic church, it was 
with a spirit of deep wonder and perplexity that he 
regarded from the school gallery the reverend man with 
countenance so demurely benign, with robes so glossy 
and so clerically flowing, with wig so minutely pow- 
dered, so rigid and so vast, who, with solemn step and 
slow, ascended the high pulpit. 

Interspersed about the school-room, crossing and re- 
crossing in endless irregularity, were benches and desks, 
black, ancient and time-worn, piled desperately with 
much bethumbed books, and so beseamed with initial 
letters, names at full length, grotesque figures and other 
multiplied efforts of the knife, as to have lost what 
little of original form might have been their portion 
in days long departed. A huge bucket with water 
stood at one extremity of the room and a clock, whose 
dimensions appeared to the boy to be stupendous, at 
the other. 

But it was not only Edgar the Dreamer who came to 
Manor House School, who passed out of the great iron 
gate and through the elm avenues to the Gothic church 



30 THE DRE AM ER 

on Sundays, and who regularly, on two afternoons in 
the week, made a decorous escape from the confinement 
of the frowning walls, and in company with the whole 
school, in orderly procession, and duly escorted by an 
usher, tramped past the church and into the pleasant 
green fields that lay beyond the quaint houses of the 
village. Edgar Goodfellow was there too' — Edgar the 
gay, the frolicsome, the lover of sports and hoaxes and 
trials of strength. 

Upon the evening of the young American's arrival, 
his schoolmates kept their distance, regarding him with 
shy curiosity, but by the recess hour next day this 
timidity had worn off, and they crowded about him 
with the pointed questions and out-spoken criticisms 
which constitute the breaking in of a new scholar. The 
boy received their sallies with such politeness and good 
humor and with such an air of modest dignity, that 
the wags soon ceased their gibes for very shame and 
the ring-leaders began to show in their manner and 
speech, an air of approval in place of the suspicion 
with which they had at first regarded him. 

When the questions, " What's your name ?" — " How 
old are you ? " — " Where do you live ? " " Were you 
sick at sea ?" — "What made you come to this school ?" 
" How high can you jump ?" — " Can you box ? " " Can 
you fight ? " — and the like, had been promptly and 
amiably answered, there was a lull. The silence was 
broken by young Edgar himself. Drawing himself up 
to the full height of his graceful little figure and 
thumping his chest with his closed fist, he said. 



THE DREAMER 31 

"Any boy who wants to may hit me here, as hard 
as he can." 

The boys looked at each other inquiringly for a mo- 
ment — they were uncertain whether this was a speci- 
men of American humor or to be taken literally. Pres- 
ently the largest and strongest among them stepped 
forward. He was a stalwart fellow for his years, but 
his excessively blond coloring, together with the effemi- 
nate style in which his mother insisted upon dressing 
him, caused the boys to give him the name of " Beauty," 
which was soon shortened into " Beaut," and had finally 
become "the Beau." 

" Will you let me hit you ? " he asked. 

" Yes," replied Edgar. " Count three and hit. You 
can't hurt me." 

As " the Beau " counted, " One — two — three " — 
Edgar gently inflated his lungs, expanding his chest to 
its fullest extent, and then, at the moment of receiving 
the blow, exhaled the air. He d.d not stagger or flinch, 
though his antagonist struck straight from the shoulder, 
with a brawny, small fist. 

The rest of the boys, in turn, struck him — each time 
counting three — with the same result. Finally "the 
Beau " said, 

" You hit mer 

Edgar counted, " One — two — three " — and struck 
out with clenched fist, but "the Beau" not knowing 
the trick, was promptly bowled over on the grass — the 
shock making quick tears start in his forget-me-not 
blue eyes. 



32 TEE DREAMER 

The boys were, one and all;, open and clamorous in 
their admiration. 

^^ Pshaw/' said young Edgar, indifferently. " It's 
nothing. All the boys in Virginia can do that." 

^^ Can yoTi play leap-frog ? " asked " Freckles " — a 
wiry looking little fellow, with carotty locks and 
a freckled nose, whose leaping had hitherto been un- 
rivalled. 

" I'll show you," was the reply. 

Instantly, a dozen backs were bent in readiness for 
the game, and over them, one by one, vaulted Edgar, 
with the lightness of a bird, . his brown curls blowing 
out behind him, as his baggy yellow thighs and thin 
red legs flew through the air. 

" Freckles " magnanimously owned himself beaten at 
his own game. 

" Let's race," said " Goggles " — a lean, long-legged, 
swathy boy, with a hooked nose and bulging, black 
eyes. 

Like a flash, the whole lot of them were off down the 
gravel walk, under the elms. Edgar and " Goggles " — 
abreast — led for a few moments, then Edgar gradually 
gained and came out some twenty feet ahead of " Gog- 
gles," and double that ahead of the foremost of the 
others. 

It was not only these accomplishments in themselves 
that made the American boy at once take the place of 
hero and leader of his form in this school of old Eng- 
land, but the quiet and unassuming mien with which 
he bore his superiority — not seeming in the least to 
despise the weakest or most backward of his competi- 



TEE DREAMER 33 

tors, and good-humoredly initiating them all into the 
little secrets of his success in performing apparently 
difficult feats. 

It was the same way with his lessons. Without 
apparent effort he distanced all of his class-mates and 
instead of pluming himself upon it, was always ready 
to help them with their Latin or their sums, whose 
answers he seemed to find by magic, almost. 



34 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER IV. 



During the winter before Edgar went to Stoke-New- 
ington, he had attended an " infant school/' in Rich- 
mond;, taught by a somewhat gaunt, but mild-mannered 
spinster, with big spectacles over her amiable blue eyes, 
a starchy cap and a little bunch of frosty cork-screw 
curls on each side of her face. As a child, she had 
played with Mr. Allan's father on their native heath, 
in Ayrshire, and to her, little Edgar was always her 
" ain wee laddie." She had spoiled him inordinately 
and unblushingly. Also, as she contentedly drew at the 
pipe filled with the offerings of choice smoking-tobacco 
which he frequently turned out of his pockets into her 
lap, she had taught him to read in her own broad Scot- 
tish accent, and to cypher. 

She had furthermore drilled him in making "pot- 
hooks and hangers," with which he covered his slate 
in neat rows, daily. But it was at the Manor House, 
in Stoke-N'ewington, that he was initiated into the 
mysteries of writing. His hands were as shapely as a 
girl's, with deft, taper fingers that seemed made to hold 
a pen or brush, and he soon developed a neat, small, 
but beautifully clear and graceful hand-writing. 

This new accomplishment became at once a delight 
to him, and as time went on opened a new world to 
Edgar the Dreamer, who now began, when he could 
snatch an opportunity to do so unobserved, to put down 
upon paper the visions of his awakening soul. Some- 



THE DREAMER 35 

times these scribblings took the form of little stories — 
crudely conceived and incoherently expressed, but rich 
in the picturesque thought and language of an excep- 
ticnably imaginative and precocious child. Sometimes 
they were in verse. For subject's these infant effusions 
had generally to do with the lonely grave in the church- 
yard in Eichmond and the sad joy of the heart that 
mourns evermore; with the beauty of flowers — the 
more beautiful because doomed to a brief life; with 
the Gothic steeple, asleep in the still, blue air, and the 
bell in whose deep iron throat dwelt a note that was 
hollow and ghostly; with the great wall around the 
Manor House grounds and with the mighty gate that 
swung upon hinges in which tlie voice of a soul in tor- 
ment seemed to be imprisoned, and with other things 
which filled him with a terror that 

"was not fright, 
" But a tremulous delight." 

His learning to write bore still anotlier fruit. 

When Mrs. Allan had first adopted him and set 
apart a room in her home for him, she had placed in a 
little cabinet therein the packet of letters his dying 
mother had given him. She had not opened the packet, 
for she felt that the letters were for the actress's child's 
eye alone. He, when he looked at it, did so with a 
feeling of mixed reverence and fascination which was 
deepened by his inability to decipher the secrets bound 
together by the bit of blue ribbon tied around it. How 
the sight of the packet recalled to him that sad, that 



36 THE DREAMER 

solemn hour in which it had been given into his 
hands! When getting him ready for boarding-school, 
Mrs. Allan had packed the letters with his other be- 
longings, for she was a woman of sentiment, and she 
felt the child should not be parted from this gift of 
his dying mother. But at length, when a knowledge of 
writing made it possible for him to read the letters, 
he was possessed with a feeling of shrinking from 
doing so, as one might shrink from opening a message 
from the grave. 

What grim, what terrible secrets, might not the little 
bundle of letters reveal ! 

It was not until his fifth and last year at Stoke- 
Newington that Edgar decided one day to look into 
the packet. He was confined to his bed by slight indis- 
position and so had the dormitory to himself and could 
risk opening the letters without fear of interruption. 
He untied the blue ribbon and the thin, yellowed papers, 
with fragments of their broken seals still sticking to 
them, fell apart. He picked up the one bearing the 
earliest date and began to read. It was from his father 
to his mother immediately after their betrothal. His 
interest was at once intensely aroused and in the order 
in which the letters came, he read, and read, and read, 
with the absorption with which he might have read 
his first novel. They were a revelation to him — a reve- 
lation of a world he had not known existed, though it 
seemed, it lay roundabout him — these love-letters of 
his parents, literally throbbing with the exalted passion 
of two young, ardent, poetic spirits. The boy had not 
dreamed that anything so beautiful could be as this un- 



THE DREAMER 37 

dying love of which they wrote and the language in 
which they made their sweet vows to each other. His 
own heart throbbed in answer to what he read. His 
imagination was violently wrought upon and exquisite 
feelings such as he had never known before awakened in 
his breast. 

Under the spell of the letters the child-poet fell in 
love — not with any creature of flesh and blood, for 
his entire acquaintance and association was with boys — 
but with the ideal of his inner vision. From that time, 
his poetic outbursts came to be filled with — more than 
aught else — the surpassing beauty, the worshipful 
goodness, the divine love of woman. He was a naturally 
reverent boy, but for these more than mortal beings, 
as they appeared to his fancy, was reserved the supreme 
worship of his romantic soul. Indeed, the adoration of 
his ideal woman — perfect in body, in mind and in soul, 
became, and was to be always, a religion to him. 

To imagine himself rescuing from a dark prison 
tower, hid in a deep wood, or from a watery grave in a 
black and rock-bound lake, at midnight, some lovely 
maiden whose every thought and heart-beat would 
thenceforth be for him alone — this became the en- 
trancing inward vision of Edgar the Dreamer — the 
poet — the lover, at whom Edgar Goodfellow with whis- 
per as insistent as the voice of Conscience, scoffed and 
sneered, seeking to make him ashamed; but all in vain. 

Of course it was to follow, as the night the day, that 
the boy would find someone in whom to dress his ideal. 
Upon a Sunday soon after his falling in love, he saw the 
vtry maiden of his dreams in the flesh. It was in the 



38 THE DREAMER 

Gothic church. From the remote pew in the galler}' 
where he sat with his school-mates, he looked down 
upon a wonderful vision of white and gold in one of the 
principal pews of the main aisle. Clad all in white 
and with a shower of golden tresses falling over her 
shoulders, she was like a glorious lily or a holy angel. 
Her eyes, uplifted in the rapture of worship, he divined, 
rather than saw, were of the hue of heaven itself. He 
loved her at once, with all his soul's might. Her name ? 
Her home? These were mysteries — sacred mysteries — 
whose unfathomableness but added to her charm. 

After that, service in the Gothic church was a much 
more important event to The Dreamer than before — an 
event looked forward to with trembling from Sunday 
to Sunday. After that too, upon his periodical week- 
day walks with the school, he would look up at the 
quaint old homesteads they passed, with their hedged 
gardens, ivied walls and sweet-scented shrubberies, and 
try to guess which was the house-wonderful in which 
she dwelt. Then suddenly, one sweet May afternoon, 
he discovered it. 

It was, as was fitting, the most antique, the most dis- 
tinguished mansion of them all. He saw her through 
the bars of the stately entrance gate as she sat beside 
her mother, on a garden-seat, tying into nosegays the 
flowers that filled her lap. Stupified by the shock of 
the discovery, he stood rooted to the ground, letting his 
school-mates go on ahead of him. She was much nearer 
him than she had been in the dusky church, and upon 
closer view, she seemed even more lovely, more flower- 
like, more angelic than ever before. He stared upon 



THE DREAMER 39 

her face with a gaze so compelling that she looked up 
and smiled at him; then, with sudden impulse, gath- 
ered her flowers in her apron, and running forward, 
handed him through the gate, a fragrant, creamy bud 
that she happened at the moment to have in her hand. 

As in a dream, he stretched his fingers for it. He 
tried to frame an expression of thanks, but his lips 
were dry and though they moved, no sound came. She 
had returned at once to her seat beside her mother, and 
the voice of the usher (who had just missed him) 
sharply calling to him to " Come on ! " was in his ears. 
He hurried forward, trembling in all his limbs. Twice 
he stumbled and nearly fell. The bud, he had quickly 
hidden within his jacket — it was too holy a thing for 
the profane eyes of his school-fellows to look upon. 

When strength and reason came back to him he was 
like a new being. Happiness gave wings to his feet 
and he walked on air. A divine song seemed to be 
singing in his ears. Mechanically, he went through the 
regular routine of school, with no difference that others 
cGuld see. To himself, heart and soul — detached and 
divorced from his body — seemed soaring in a new and 
beautiful world in which lessons and teachers had no 
place, no part. Whenever it was possible for him to do 
so unobserved, he would snatch the rose from his bosom 
and kiss and caress it. He only lived to see Sunday 
come round. 

But on the next Sunday and the next she was absent 
from her accustomed place. Such a thing had not hap- 
pened before since he had first seen her. He was filled 



40 TEE DREAMER 

with the first real anxiety he had ever known. Here 
was a mystery in which there was no charm ! 

The Wednesday after the second Sunday upon which 
he had missed her was a day dropped out of heaven. 
The mild;, early summer air that floated through the 
open windows into the gloomy^ oak-ceiled schoolroom, 
was ambrosial with the breathings of flowers. Young 
Edgar could not fix his thoughts upon the page before ' 
him. The out-of-door world was calling to him. He 
found himself listening to the birds in the trees out- 
side and gazing through the narrow, pointed windows at 
the waving branches. 

Suddenly his heart stopped. The deep, sweet, hol- 
low, ghostlike voice of the bell in the steeple, tolling for 
a funeral, was borne to his ears. In a moment his 
fevered imagination associated the tolling with the ab- 
sence of his divinity from her pew, and in spite of pas- 
sionately assuring himself that it could not be, and re- 
calling how lovely and full of health she had been when 
he saw her through the gate, he was possessed by deep 
melancholy. 

The days and hours until Sunday seemed an age to 
him — an age of foreboding and dread — but they at 
last passed by. In a fever of anxiety, he walked with 
the rest of the boys to church, and mounted the steps to 
the school gallery. 

It was early ; few of the worshippers had arrived, but 
in a little while there was a stir near the door. A group 
of figures shrouded in the black habiliments of woe 
were moving up the aisle — were entering her pew, 
from which alas, she was again absent ! 



TEE DREAMER 41 

. Then he knew — knew that she would enter that 
sacred place nevermore! 

After the service there were inquiries as to the cause 
of a commotion in the gallery occupied by the Manor 
House School, and it was said in reply that the weather 
being excessively hot for the season, one of the boys had 
fainted. 



42 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER V. 



The June following young Edgar's eleventh birthday 
found him in Eichmond once more. The village-like 
little capital was all greenery and roses and sunshine 
and bird-song and light-hearted laughter, and he felt, 
with a glow, that it was good to be back. 

In the five years of his absence he had grown quite 
tall for his age, with a certain dignity and self-posses- 
sion of bearing acquired from becoming accustomed to 
depend upon himself. All that was left of the nut- 
brown curls that used to flow over his shoulders were 
the clustering ringlets that covered his head and framed 
his large brow. His absence had also wrought in him 
other and more subtle changes which did not appear to 
the friends who remarked upon what a great boy he had 
grown — a maturity from having lived in another world — 
from having had his thoughts expanded by new scenes 
and quickened by the suggestions of historic association 
and surroundings. 

But with his return, England and Stoke-Newington 
sank into the shadowy past — their spell weakened, for 
the time being, by the thought-absorbing, heart-fillling 
scenes of which he had now become a part. The years 
at the Manor House School were as a dream — this was 
the real thing — this was Home. Home — ah, the charm 
of that word and all it implied ! His heart swelled, his 
eyes grew misty as he said it over and over to himself. 
The clatter of drays "down town" was like music in his 



TEE DREAMER 43 

ears, the dusty streets of the residential section were fair 
to his eyes for old time's sake. How he loved the very 
pavement under his feet, rough and uneven as it was; 
how dearly he loved the trees that he had climbed (and 
would climb again) which stretched their friendly 
boughs over his head ! 

In a state of happy excitement he rushed about town, 
visiting his old haunts to see if they were still there, 
and " the same/' 

" Comrade," his brown spaniel — ^his favorite of all his 
pets — had grown old and sober and had quite forgotten 
him, but his love was soon reawakened. The boys he 
had played with, too, had almost forgotten him, but 
his return called him to mind again and put them all 
in a flutter. A boy who had lived five years on the 
other side of the ocean and had been to an English 
boarding school, was not seen in Richmond every day. 
Mrs. Allan gave him a party to which all of the chil- 
dren in their circle were invited. In anticipation of 
this, he had purchased in London, out of the abundance 
of pocket-money with which his doting foster-mother 
always saw to it he was provided, a number of little 
gifts to be distributed among the boys at home. These, 
with the distinction his travels gave him, made him the 
man of the hour among Richmond children. And how- 
much he had to tell ! At Stoke-Newington it was al- 
ways the boys at home that were the heroes of the 
stories he spun by the yard for the entertainment of his 
school-fellows — ^the literal among whom had come to 
believe that there was no feat a Virginia boy could not 



44 THE DREAMER 

perform. Now that he was in Eichmond, the Stoke- 
l^ewington boys themselves loomed up as the wonder- 
workers, and his playmates listened with admiration 
and with such expression as, " Caesar's ghost 1 " — 
" Jiminy ! '^ — " Cracky ! " and the like, as he narrated 
his tales of " Freckles," " Goggles," " the Beau," and 
the rest. 

One of his first visits after reaching home was to 
his old black " Mammy," in the tiny cottage, with its 
prolific garden-spot, on the outskirts of the town, in 
which Mr. Allan had installed her and her husband, 
" Uncle Billy," before leaving Virginia. 

" Mammy " was expecting him. With one half of 
her attention upon the white cotton socks she was 
knitting for her spouse and the other half on the gate 
of her small garden through which her " chile " would 
come, she sat in her doorway awaiting him. She was 
splendidly arrayed in her new purple calico and a big 
white apron, just from under the iron. Her gayeslj 
bandanna "hankercher" covered her tightly "wropped" 
locks from view and the snowiest of " neckerchers " 
was crossed over her ample bosom. Her kind, black 
countenance was soft with thoughts of love. 

" Uncle Billy," too, was spruced for the occasion. 
Indeed, he was quite magnificent in a " biled shut," 
with ruffles, and an old dresscoat of " Marster's. " His 
top-boots were elaborately blacked, and a somewhat 
battered stove-pipe hat crowned his bushy grey wool. 
Each of the old folks comfortably smoked a corn-cob 
pipe. 



THE DREAMER 45 

*^ Mammy ^' saw her bo}^ coming first. She could 
hardly believe it was he — he was so tall — but she was 
up and away, down the path, in a flash. Half-way to 
the gate that opened on the little back street, she met 
him and enveloped him at once in her loving anns. 

" Bless de Lord, my soul ! " she repeated over and 
over again in a sort of chant, as she held him against 
her bosom and rocked back and forth on her broad 
feet, tears of joy rolling down her face. 

"De probable am returned," announced Uncle Billy, 
solemnly. 

" G'long, Billy," she said, contemptuously. " He 
ain' no probable. He jes' Mammy's own li'l' chile, if 
he is growed so tall ! " 

" I'se only 'peatin' what de Good Book say," replied 
Uncle Billy, with dignity. 

Edgar was crying too, and laughing at the same 
time. 

" Howdy, Uncle Billy," said he, stretching a hand to 
the old man as soon as he could extricate himself from 
Mammy's embrace. " My, my, you do look scrumptious ! 
How's the rheumatiz?" 

" Now jes' heah dat ! Eememberin' uv de ole man's 
rheumatiz arter all dis time !" exclaimed the delighted 
Uncle Billy. " 'Twus mighty po'ly, thankee, li'l 
Marster, but de sight o' you done make it better a'ready. 
I 'clar 'fo' Gracious, if de sight of you wouldn' be 
good for so' eyes ! Socifyin' wid dem wile furren na- 
tions ain' hu't you a bit— 'deed it ain't!" 



46 THE DREAMER 

" How did you expect them to hurt me. Uncle Billy ? " 
asked Edgar, laughing. 

" I was ^f card dey mought make a Injun, or sum'in' 
out'n you." 

" G'long, Billy/^ put in his wife, with increased con- 
tempt, " Marse Eddie ain' been socifyin' wid no In- 
juns — he been socifyin' wid kings an' queens' settin' on 
dey thrones, wid crowns on dey haids an' spectres in 
dey ban's ! Come 'long in de house. Honey, an' set 
awhile wid Mammy." 

As they crossed the threshold of the humble abode, 
Edgar looked around upon its familiar, homely snug- 
ness with satisfaction — at the huge, four-post bed, cov- 
ered with a cheerful " log cabin " quilt made of scraps 
of calico of every known hue and pattern ; at the white- 
washed walls adorned with pictures cut from old books 
and magazines; at the "shelf," as Mammy called the 
mantel-piece, with its lambrequin of scallopped strips 
of newspaper, and its china vases filled with hundred- 
leaf roses and pinks ; at the spotless bare floor and home- 
made split-bottomed chairs; at the small, but bright, 
windows, with their rows of geraniums and verbenas, 
brilliantly blooming in boxes, tin-cans and broken-nosed 
tea-pots. 

Almost all that Mammy could say was, 

" Lordy, Lordy, Honey, how you has growed !" Or, 
" Jes' to think of Mammy's baby sech a big boy ! " 

Presently a shadow crossed her face. " Honey," she 
said, "You gittin' to be sech a man now, you won't 
have no mo' use fur po' ole Mammy. Dar won't be a 
thing fur her to do fur sech a big man-chile." 



THE DREAMER 47 

" Don't jou believe that, for a minute. Mammy," was 
the quick reply. "I was just wondering if you had for- 
gotten how to make those good ash-cakes." 

" Now, jes' listen to de chile, makin' game o' his ole 
Mammy ! " she exclaimed. " Livin' so high wid all dem 
hifalutin' kings an' queens an' sech, an' den comin' 
back here an' makin' ten' he wouldn' 'spise Mammy's 
ash-cakes ! " 

"I'm in dead earnest. Mammy. Indeed, indeed and 
double deed, I am. Kings and queens don't' have any- 
thing on their tables half as good as one of your ash- 
cakes, with a glass of cool butter-milk." 

" Dat so. Honey ? " she queried, with wonder. " Den 
you sho'ly shall have some, right away. Mammy churn 
dis ve'y mornin', and dars a pitcher of buttermilk cool- 
in' in de spring dis minute. You des' make you'se'f 
at home an' I'll step in de kitchen an' cook you a ash- 
cake in a jiffy. Billy, you pick me some nice, big cab- 
bage leaves t'o bake it in whilst I'm mixin' de dough, 
an' den go an' git de butter-milk an' a pat o' dat butter 
I made dis mornin' out'n de spring." 

Edgar and Uncle Billy followed her into the kitchen 
where she deftly mixed the corn-meal dough, shaped it 
in her hands into a thick round cake, which she 
wrapped in fresh cabbage leaves and put' down in the 
hot ashes on the hearth to bake. Meantime the follow- 
ing conversation between Edgar and the old "Uncle:" 

" Uncle Billy do you ever see ghosts now-adays ? " 

" To be sho', li'l' Marster, to be sho'. Sees 'em mos' 
any time. Saw one las' Sunday night." 

" What was it like. Uncle Billy ? " 



48 THE DREAMER 

"Like, Honey? — Like ole Mose, dafs what tVus 
like. Does you ^member Mose whar useter drive de 
hotel hack?'' 

"Yes, he's dead isn't he?" 

"Yes, suh, daid as a do' nail. Dat's de cur'us part 
on it. He's daid an' was buried las' Sunday ebenin' — 
buried deep. I know, 'ca'se I wus dar m'se'f. But dat 
night when I had gone to bed an' wus gittin' off to 
meh fus' nap, I wus woke up on a sudden by de noise 
uv a gre't stompin' an' trompin' an snortin' in de 
road. I jump up an' look out de winder, an' I 'clar' 
'fo' Gracious if dar wam't Mose, natchel as life, 
horses an' hack an' all, tearin' by at a break-neck speed. 
I'se seed many a ghos' an' a ha'nt in meh time, uv 
liumans, but dat wus de fus' time I uver heard tell uv 
a horse or a hack risin' f'um de daid. 'Twus skeery, 
sho' ! " 

Before Edgar had time for comment upon this re- 
markable apparition. Mammy set before him the 
" snack " she had prepared of smoking ash-cake and 
fresh butter, on her best china plate — the one with 
the gilt band — and placed at his right hand a goblet 
and a stone pitcher of cool butter-milk. A luncheon, 
indeed, fit to be set before royalty, though it is not 
likely that any of them ever had such an one offered 
them — poor things ! 

Edgar did full justice to the feast and was warm in 
his praises of it'. Then, before taking his leave, he 
placed in Mammy's hands a parcel containing gifts 
from the other side of the water for her and Uncle 
Billy. There is nothing so dear to the heart of an 



THE DREAMER 49 

old-time negro as a present, and as the aged couple 
opened the package and drew out its treasures, their 
black faces fairly shone with delight. Mammy could 
not forbear giving her "chile " a hug of gratitude and 
freshly springing love, while Uncle Billy heartily de- 
clared, 

" De Lord will sho'ly bless you, liT Marster, fur de 
Good Book do p'intedly say dat He do love one chuf- 
ful giver." 

To young Edgar's home-keeping pla3Tnates, he seemed 
to be the luckiest boy in the world, and indeed, his 
brief existence had been up to this time, as fortunate as 
it appeared to them. Even the beautiful sorrow of his 
mother's death had filled his life with poetry and 
brought him sympathy and affection in abundant meas- 
ure. 

But bitterness was soon enough to enter his soul. 
His thoughts from the moment of his return t'o Eich- 
mond, had frequently turned to the white church and 
churchyard on the hill — and to the grave beside the 
wall. Thither he was determined to go as soon as he 
possibly could, but it was too sacred a pilgrimage to be 
mentioned to anyone — it must be as secret as he could 
make it; and so he must await an opportunity to slip 
off when he would be least apt to be missed. He chose 
a sultry afternoon when Mr. and Mrs. Allan were tak- 
ing a long drive into the country. He waited until 
sunset — thinking there would be less probability of 
meeting anyone in the churchyard after that hour than 



50 TEE DREAMER 

earlier — and set out, taking with him a cluster of white 
roses from the summer-house in the garden. 

It was nearly dusk when he reached the church and 
climbed the steps that led to the walled graveyard, ele- 
vated above the street-level. Never had the spot looked so 
fair to him. The white spire, piercing the blue sky, seemed 
almost to touch the slender new moon, with the even- 
ing star glimmering by her side. The air was sweet with 
the breath of roses and honeysuckle, and the graves 
were deeply, intensely green. Long he lay upon the 
one by the wall, near the head of which he had placed 
his white roses — looking up at the silver spire and the 
silver star and the moon's silver bow-— so long that he 
forgot the passage of time, and when he reached home 
and went in out of the night to the bright dining-room, 
blinking his great grey eyes to accustom them to the 
lamp-light, supper was over. 

The keen eyes of John Allan looked sternly upon him 
from under their fierce brows. The boy saw at once that 
his foster-father was very angry. 

'^ Where have you been ? " he demanded, harshly. 

" Nowhere," replied the boy. 

" What have you been doing all this time ? '' 

"Nothing," was the answer. 

" Nowhere ? Nothing ? Don't nowhere and nothing 
me. Sir. Those are the replies — the lying replies — 
of a boy who has been in mischief. If you had not 
been where you shouldn't have been, and doing as you 
shouldn't have done, you would not be ashamed to tell. 
Now, Sir, tell me at once, where you have been and 
what you have been doing ? " 



TEE DREAMER 51 

The boy grew pale, but made no reply, and in the 
eyes fixed on Mr. Allan's face was a provokingly stub- 
born look. The man's wrath waxed warmer. His voice 
rose. In a tone of utter exasperation he cried, " Tell 
me at once, I say, or you shall have the severest flog- 
ging you ever had in your life !" 

The boy grew paler still, and his eyes more stubborn. 
A scowl settled upon his brow and a look of dogged 
determination about his mouth, but still he spoke not a 
word. 

Mrs. Allan looked from one to the other of these two 
beings — husband and son — who made her heart's 
world. The evening was warm and she wore a simple 
white dress with low neck and short sleeves. Anxiety 
clouded her lovely face, yet never had she looked more 
girlishly sweet — more appealing ; but the silent plea in 
her beautiful, troubled eyes was lost on John Allan, 
much as he loved her. 

"Tell him, Eddie dear," she implored. "Don't be 
afraid. Speak up like a man ! " 

Still silence. 

She walked over to the table where the boy sat 
before the untouched supper that had been saved for 
him, and dropped upon one knee beside him. She 
placed her arm around him and drew him against her 
gentle bosom — he suffering her, though not returning 
the caress. 

" Tell me, Eddie, darling— tell Mother," she coaxed. 

The grey eyes softened, the brow lifted. "There's 
nothing t'o tell. Mother," he gently replied. 

Mr. Allan rose from his chair. "I'll give you five 



52 TEE DREAMER 

minutes in which to find something to tell," he ex- 
claimed, shaking a trembling finger at the culprit ; then 
stalked out of the room. 

In his absence his wife fell upon the neck of the 
pale, frowning child, covering his face and his curly- 
head with kisses, and beseeching him with honeyed en- 
dearments, to be a good boy and obey his father. But 
the little figure seemed to have turned to stone in her 
arms. In less than the five minutes Mr. Allan was back 
in the room, trimming a long switch cut from one of 
the trees in the garden as he came. 

" Are you ready to tell me the truth? " he demanded. 

No answer. 

Still trimming the switch, he approached the boy. 
Frances Allan trembled. Eising from the child's side, 
she clasped her husband's arm in both her hands. 

" Don't, John ! Don't, please, John dear. I can't 
stand it," she breathed. He put her aside, firmly. 

"Don't be silly, Frances. You are interfering with 
my duty. Can't you see that I must teach the boy to 
make you a better return for your kindness than lying 
to hide his mischief ? " 

" But suppose that he is telling the truth, John, and 
"that he has been doing nothing worse than wandering 
about the streets? You know the way he has always 
had of roaming about by himself, at times." 

" And do you think roaming about the streets at this 
time of night proper employment for a boy of eleven? 
Would you have him grow up into a vagabond ? A boy 
dependent upon the bounty of strangers can ill afford 
to cultivate such idle habits ! '^ 



THE DREAMER 53 

The boy's already large and dark pupils dilated and 
darkened until his eyes looked like black, storm-swept 
pools. His already white face grew livid. He drew 
back as if he had been struck and fixed upon his foster- 
father a gaze in which every spark of affection was, 
for the moment, dead. He had been humiliated by the 
threat of a flogging, but the prospect of the hardest 
stroke his body might receive was as nothing to him 
now. His sensitive soul had been smitten a blow the 
smart of which he would carry with him to his last 
day. " Dependent upon the bounty of strangers," — of 
strangers! 

Up to this time he had been the darling little son of 
an over-fond mother, and though his foster-father had 
been at times, stern and unsympathetic with him, no 
hint had ever before dropped from him to indicate that 
the child was not as much his own as the sons of other 
fathers were their own — that he was not as much en- 
titled to the good things of life which were heaped upon 
him without the asking as an own son would have 
been. His comforts — his pleasures had been so easily, 
so plentifully bestowed that the little dreamer had 
never before awaked to a realization of a difference be- 
tween his relation with his parents and the relation of 
other children with theirs. Brought face to face with 
this hard, cold fact for the first time, and so suddenly, 
he was for the moment stunned by it. He felt that a 
flood of deep waters in which he was floundering help- 
lessly was overwhelming him. 

A deep silence had followed the last words of Mr. 
Allan, who continued to trim the switch, while his wife. 



M THE DREAMER 

sinking into a chair^ bowed lier face in her arms, folded 
upon the table, and began to cry softly. The gentle 
sounds of her weeping seemed but further to infuriate 
her husband. 

" Come with me," he commanded, placing his hand 
on the shoulder of the child, who unresistingly suffered 
himself to be pushed along toward his foster-father's 
room. Frances Allan broke into wild sobbing and 
placed her fingers against her ears that she might not 
hear the screams of her pet. But there were no screams. 
Silently, and with an air of dignity it was marvellous 
so small a figure could command, the beautiful boy re- 
ceived the blows. When one's soul has been hurt, what 
matters mere physical pain? When both the strength 
and the passion of Mr. Allan had been somewhat spent, 
he ceased laying on blows and asked in a calmed voice, 
" Are you ready to tell me the truth now ? " 
In one moment of time the child lived over again 
the beautiful hour at his mother's grave. He saw again 
the silver spire and the silver half-moon and the silver 
star — smelted the blended odors of honeysuckle and 
rose, made sweeter by the gathering dews, and felt the 
coolness and freshnes of the long green grass that cov- 
ered the grave. Who knew but that deep down under 
the sweet grass she had been conscious he was there — 
had felt his heart beat and heard his loving whispers 
as of old, and loved him still, and understood, though 
she would see him nevermore ? Share the secret of that 
holy hour with anyone — of all people, with this wrath- 
ful, blind, unsympathizing man who had just confessed 
himself a stranger to him ? Never ! 



THE DREAMER 55 

A faint smile, full of peace, settled upon his poet's 
face, but lie answered never a word. 

There was a stir at the door. John Allan looked 
toward it. His wife stood there drying her eyes. He 
turned to the boy again. 

"Go with your mother and get your supper/' he 
commanded. 

" I don't want it/' was the reply. 

'^Well, go to bed then, and tomorrow afternoon you 
are to spend in your own room, where I hope meditation 
upon your idle ways may bring you to something like 
repentance." 

The boy paused half-way to the door. "Tomorrow 
is the day I'm going swimming with the boys. You 
promised that I might go." 

"Well, I take back the promise, that's all." 

"Don't you think you've punished him enough for 
this time, John ? " timidly asked his wife. 

" N'o boy is ever punished enough until he is con- 
quered," was the reply. "And Edgar is far from 
that!" 

Mrs. Allan, with her arm about the little culprit's 
shoulder went with him to his room. How she wished 
that he would let her cuddle him in her lap and sing to 
him and tell him stories and then hear him his prayers 
at her knee and tuck him in bed as in the old days 
before he went to boarding-school! Her heart ached 
for him, though she had no notion of the bitterness, 
the rebellion, that were rankling in his. As she kissed 
him goodnight she whispered. 



56 THE DREAMER 

" You shall have your swim in the river, tomorrow, 
Eddie darling; I'll see that you do/' 

" Don't you ask Mm to let me do anything/' he pro- 
tested, passionately. " I'm going without asking him. 
He disowned me for a son, I'll disown him for a 
father!" 

He loved her but he was glad when the door closed 
behind her so that he could think it all out for himself 
in the dark — the dear dark that he had always loved 
so well and that was now as balm to his bruised spirit. 
The worst of it was that he could not disown John 
Allan as a father. He had to confess to himself with 
renewed bitterness that he was indeed, and by no fault 
of his own — a helpless dependent upon the charity of 
this man who had, in taunting him with the fact, 
wounded him so grievously. His impulse was to run 
away — but where could he go ? Though his small purse 
held at that moment a generous amount of spending 
money for a boy " going on twelve," it would be a mere 
nothing toward taking him anywhere. It would not 
afford him shelter and food for a day, and he knew it — 
it would not take him to the only place where he knew 
he had kindred — Baltimore. And what if he could get 
as far as Baltimore, would he care to go there? To 
assert his independence of the charity of John Allan 
only to throw himself upon the charity of relatives who 
had never noticed him — whom he hated because they 
had never forgiven his father for marr)dng the angel 
mother around whose memory his fondest dreams 
clung ? 

ISTo, he could not disown Mr. Allan — not yet; but 



THE DREAMER 57 

the good things of life received from his hands had 
henceforth lost their flavor and would be like Dead Sea 
fruit upon his lips. Hitherto, though he knew, of 
course, that he was not the Allans' own child, he had 
never once been made to feel that he was any the less 
entitled to their bounty. They had adopted him of 
their own free will to fill the empty arms of a woman 
with a mother's heart who had never been a mother, 
and that woman had lavished upon him almost more 
than a mother's love — certainly more than a prudent 
mother's indulgence. He had been the most spoiled and 
petted child of his circle, and the bounty had been 
heaped upon him in a manner that made him feel — 
child though he was — the Joy that the giving brought 
the giver, and therefore no burden of obligation upon 
himself in receiving. If Mr. Allan had been strict 
to a point of harshness with him, at times, Mr. Allan 
was a born disciplinarian — it seemed natural for him 
to be stern and unsympathetic and those who knew 
him best took his stiffness and hardness with many 
grains of allowance, remembering his upright life and 
his open-handed charities. He had administered pun- 
ishment upon the little lad when he was naughty in the 
years before he went away to school, and the little lad 
had taken his medicine philosophically like other 
naughty boys — had cried lustily, then dried his eyes 
and forgotten all about it in the pleasure which the 
goodies and petting he always had from his pretty, 
tender-hearted foster-mother at such times gave him. 
But this was different. He was a big lad now — very 
big and old, he felt', far too big to be flogged ; quite big 



58 THE DREAMER 

enough to visit his mother's grave, if he chose, without 
having to talk about it. And he had not only been 
flogged because he would not reveal his sacred, sweet 
secret, but had had his dependence upon charity thrown 
up at him ! 

Henceforth, he felt, his life would be a lonely one, 
for he now knew that he was different from other boyi, 
all of whom (in his acquaintance) had fathers to whose 
bounty they had a right — the right of sonship. Yes, 
he was a very big boy (he told himself) and he had not 
cried when he was flogged, but under the cover of the 
kindly dark, hot tears of indignation, hurt pride and 
pity for his own loneliness — his singularity — made all 
his pillow wet. 

Comfort came to him from an unexpected source. 
The door of his room had been closed, but not latched. 
It was now pushed open by " Comrade,^^ his old spaniel, 
who made straight for his side, first pushing his nose 
against his face and then leaping upon the bed and 
nestling down close to him, with a sigh of satisfaction. 
The desolate boy welcomed this dmnb, affectionate com- 
panionship. The feel of the warm, soft body, and the 
thought of the velvety brown eyes which he could not 
see in the dark, but knew were fixed upon him with 
their intense, loving gaze, were soothing to his over- 
wrought nerves. Here was something whose love could 
be counted upon — something as dependent upon him 
as he was upon Mr. Allan; yet what a joy he found in 
the very dependence of this devoted, soft-eyed creature ! 
Never would he taunt Comrade with his dependence 
upon charity. 



THE DREAMER i59 

"No;" he said, his hands deep in the silky coat, "I 
would not insult a dog as he has insulted me! Never 
mind. Comrade, old fellow, we'll have our swim in the 
river tomorrow, and he may flog me again if he likes." 

But he was not flogged the next day. An important 
business engagement occupied Mr. Allan the whole 
afternoon, and when he came in late, tired and pre- 
occupied, he found Edgar fresh and glowing from his 
exercise in the river, the curls still damp upon his fore- 
head, quietly eating his supper with his mother. She 
knew, but tender creature that she was, she was pre- 
pared to do anything short of fibbing to shield her 
pet from another out-burst. But John Allan, still ab- 
sorbed in business cares, hardly looked toward the boy, 
and asked not a question. 



60 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTEE VI. 



The home of the Allans was never quite the same to 
Edgar Poe after that night. A wall had been raised 
between him and his foster-father that would never be 
scaled. He was still indulged in a generous amount of 
pocket money which he invariably proceeded to get rid 
of as fast as he could — lavishing it upon the enjoyment 
of his friends as freely as it had been lavished upon 
him. He had plenty of pets and toys, went to dancing 
school, in which his natural love of dancing made him 
delight, and was given stiff but merry little parties, at 
which old Cy, the black fiddler played and called the 
figures, and the little host and his friends conformed 
to the strict, ceremonious etiquette observed by the chil- 
dren as well as the grown people of the day. 

For these indulgences Frances Allan was chiefly re- 
sponsible. The one weak spot in the armor of austerity 
in which John Allan clothed himself was his love for 
his wife, and it was often against what he felt to be his 
better judgment that he acquiesced in her system of 
child-spoiling. He felt a solemn responsibility toward 
the boy, and he did his duty by him, as he saw it, faith- 
fully. It was not in the least his fault that he did not 
see that under the broad white brow and sunny ringlets 
was a brain in which, like the sky in a dew-drop, a 
whole world was reflected, with ever changing pagean- 
try, and that the abstracted expression in the boy's eye» 
that he thought could only mean that he was " hatching 



TEE DREAMER 61 

mischief/' really indicated that the creative faculty in 
budding genius was awake and at work. 

For a child Edgar's age to be making trials at writ- 
ing poetry Mr. Allan regarded as sheer idleness, to bo 
promptly suppressed. Indeed, when he discoverd that 
the boy had been guilty of such foolishness, he emphati- 
cally ordered him not t'o repeat it. To counteract the 
effects of his wife's spoiling of her adopted son, he felt 
it his duty to place all manner of restrictions upon his 
liberty, which the freedom-loving boy, with the conniv- 
ance of his mother and the negro servants who adored 
him, disregarded whenever it was possible. Though 
bathing in the river was (except upon rare occasions) 
prohibited, Edgar became before summer was over, the 
most expert swimmer and diver of his years in town, 
and many an afternoon when Mr. Allan supposed that 
he was in his room, to which he had been ordered for 
the purpose of disciplining his will and character, or for 
punishment, he was far beyond the city's limits roaming 
the woods, the fields, or the river-banks— joyously, and 
without a prick of conscience (for all his disobedience) 
feeding his growing soul upon the beauties of tree, and 
sky, and cliff, and water-fall. 

And so, in spite of the melancholy moods in which 
he was occasionally plunged by the bitterness which had 
found lodgment in his breast, the summer was upon the 
whole a happy one to the boy. He was so young and 
the world was so beautiful ! He could not remember al- 
ways to be unhappy. Edgar Goodfellow, as well as Edgar 
the Dreamer, revelled in the world of Out-of-Door. To 
the one all manner of muscular sport and exercise was 



62 THE DREAMER 

as the breath of his nostrils; to the other, whose favor- 
ite stories were ancient myths and fairy-tales, all natu- 
ral phenomena possessed vivid personality. He loved 
to trace pictures in the clouds. In the rustling of corn 
or the stirring of leaves in the trees, or in the sound of 
running waters he heard voices which spoke to him of 
delightsome things, bringing to his full, grey eyes, as he 
hearkened, a soft, romantic look, and touching his lips 
and his cheeks vsdth a radiant spirituality. 

The cottage, on Clay Street', to which the Allans had 
removed soon after their return from England, was in 
a quiet part of the town. The window of Edgar's own, 
quaint little room in the dormer roof, with its shelving 
walls, gave him a fair view of the sky, and brought him 
sweet airs wafted across the garden of old-fashioned 
flowers below. Here, such hours as he spent from 
choice or by command were not lonely, for, sitting by 
the little window, many a story or poem was thought 
out; or buried in some favorite book his thoughts would 
be borne away as if on wings to a world where imagina- 
tion was king. 

In the fall he was entered at Mr. Clarke's school. 
The school-room, with its white-washed walls and the 
sun pouring in, unrestricted, through the commonplace, 
big, bare windows, was very different from tlie great, 
gloomy Gothic room at old Stoke-^N'ewington — so full 
of mystery and suggestion — but Edgar found it a 
pleasant place in which to be upon that cool fresh morn- 
ing in late September, when he made its acquaintance. 
He telt full of mental activity and ready to go to work 



THE DREAMER 63 

with a will upon his Latin, his French and his mathe- 
matics. Since his return from England, in June, he 
had become acquainted with most of the boys who wera 
to be his school-fellows, and he took at once to the 
school-master. Professor Clarke, of Trinity College, 
Dublin — a middle-aged bachelor of Irish birth, an 
accomplished gentleman and a very human creature, 
with a big heart, a high ideal of what boys might be 
and abundant tolerance of what they generally were. If 
'he had a quick temper, he had also a quick wit, and a 
quick appreciation of talent and sympathy with timorous 
aspirations. 

It' had been Master Clarke's suggestion that his new 
pupil, who was known as Edgar Allan, should put his 
own name upon the school register. Edgar, looking 
questioningly up into Mr. Allan's face, was glad to 
read approval there, and with a thrill of pride he wrote 
upon the book, in the small, clear hand that had become 
characteristic of him: 

" Edgar Allan Poe." 

He was proud of his name and proud of his father, 
of whom he remembered nothing, but in whose veins, 
he knew, had run patriot blood, and who had had the 
independence to risk all for love of the beautiful mother 
of worshipped memory. It was with straightened 
shoulders and a high head that he took the seat assigned 
him at the clumsy desk, in the bare, ugly room of the 
school in which he was to be known for the first time as 
Edgar Poe. He felt that in coming into his own name 
he had come into a proud heritage. 

Mr. Clarke's Irish heart warmed toward him. He 



64 THE DREAMER 

divined in the big-browed^ big-eyed boy a unique and 
gifted personality and proceeded with the uttermost tact 
to do his best toward the cultivation of his talents. The 
result was that Edgar not only acquitted himself bril- 
liantly in his studies^ but progressed well in his verse- 
making, which though, since Mr. Allan's prohibition, it 
had been kept secret in his home, was freely acknowl- 
edged to teacher and school-fellows. 

By his class-mates he was deemed a wonder. He was 
so easily first among them in everything — in the simple 
athletics with which they were familiar, as well as in 
studies — and his talent for rhyming and drawing seemed 
to set him upon a sort of pedestal. 

In the first blush of triumph these little successes 
gave him, young Edgar's head was in a fair way to be 
turned. He saw himself (in fancy) the leader^ the popu- 
iai favorite of the whole school. Indeed, he flattered 
himself he had leaped at a single bound to this position 
at the moment, almost, of his entrance. But he soon 
began to see that he was mistaken. While he was con- 
scious of the unconcealed admiration of most, and the 
ill-concealed envy of a few of the boys, of his mental and 
physical abilities, he began, as time went on, to suspect — 
then to be sure — that for some reason that baffled all 
his ingenuity to fathom, he was not accorded the posi- 
tion in the school that was the natural reward for super- 
iority of endowment and performance. This place was 
filled instead by Nat Howard, a boy who, he told him- 
self, he was without the slightest vanity bound to see 
was distinctly second to him in every way. 

He noticed that whatever Nat proposed was invariably 



THE DREAMER '65 

done, so that he was forced either to follow where he 
should have led, or be left out" of everything. Often 
when he joined the boys listening with interest to Nat's 
heavy jokes and talk, a silence would fall upon the 
company, which in a short while would break up — 
the boys going off in twos and threes, leaving him to 
his own society or that of a small minority composed 
of two or three boys for the most part younger than 
himself, who in spite of the popular taste for Nat, pre- 
ferred him and were captivated by his clever accom- 
plishments. 

That there was some reason why he was thus shut out 
from personal intimacy by school-mates who acknowl- 
edged and admired his powers he felt sure, and he was 
determined to ferrit it out. In the meantime his heart, 
always peculiarly responsive to affection, answered with 
warmth to the devotion of the small coterie who were 
independent enough to swear fealty to him. He helped 
them with their lessons, initiated them into the myste- 
ries of boxing and other manly exercises, went swim- 
ming and gunning with them, and occasionally de- 
lighted them by showing them his poems and the little 
sketches with which he sometimes illustrated his manu- 
script, in the making. 

It must be confessed that there was little in these 
compositions to set the world afire. They would only 
be counted remarkable as the work of a school-boy in 
his early teens, and were practice work — nothing more. 
They served their purpose, then sank into the oblivion 
which was their meet" destiny. But to Jaxjk Preston, 



66 THE DREAMER 

Dick Ambler^ Eob Stanard and Rob Sully, and one or 
two others, they were master-pieces. 

These boys, as well as Edgar, were giving serious 
attention to their linen, the care of their hands, and the 
precise parting of their hair, just' then; and a close 
observer might often have detected them in the act of 
furtively feeling their upper lips with anxious fore- 
finger in the vain hope of discovering the appearance — ■ 
if ever so slight — of a downy growth thereupon. For 
they, as well as he, were making sheep's eyes at those 
wonderful visions in golden locks and jetty locks, with 
brown eyes and blue eyes, with fluttering ribbons and 
snowy pinafores, known as ^'^Miss Jane Mackenzie's 
girls," who were the inspiration of most of their poet- 
chum's invocations of the muse. The little hymns in 
praise of the charms of these girls were generally 
adorned with pen or pencil sketches of the fair charmers 
themselves. 

Poor Miss Jane had a sad time of it. As the accom- 
plished principal of a choice Young Ladies Boarding 
and Day School, she enjoyed an enviable position in 
the politest society in town. Parents of young ladies 
under her care congratulated themselves alike upon her 
strict rule and her learning, her refinement of manners 
and conversation and her distinguished appearance. 
She was tall and stately and in her decorous garb of 
black silk that could have "stood alone," and an ele- 
gant cap of " real " lace with lavender ribbons softening 
the precise waves of her iron-grey hair, she made a 
most impressive figure — one that would have inspired 
with profound respect any male creature living saving 



THE DREAMER '67 

that incorrigible non-respecter of persons and person- 
ages, especially of lady principals — the Boy. For the 
"forming" of young ladies, Miss Jane had a positive 
forte, but the genus boy was an unknown quantity to 
her, and worse — he was a positive terror. For one of 
them to invade the sacred precincts of her school, or its 
grounds, seemed to her maiden soul rank sacrilege; to 
scale her garden wall after dark for the purpose of 
attaching a letter to a string let down from a window 
to receive it, was nothing short of criminal. For one 
of her girls to receive offerings of candy and original 
poetry — love poetry — from one of these terrible crea- 
tures ; such an offence was unspeakably shocking. 

Yet discovery of such offences happened often enough 
to give her repeated shocks, and to confirm her in her 
belief in the total depravity, the hopeless wickedness of 
all boys — especially of John Allan's adopted son. 

In spite of her vigilance, Edgar Poe found the means 
to outwit her, and to transmit his effusions, without 
difficulty, to her fair charges, who with tresses primly 
parted and braided and meek eyes bent in evident 
absorption upon their books, were the very pictures of 
docile obedience, and bore in their outward looks no 
hint of the guilty consciences that should, by rights, 
have been destroying their peace. 

Miss Jane was the sister of Mr. Mackenzie who had 
adopted little Rosalie Poe. Rosalie was, at Miss Jane's 
invitation, a pupil in the school, but (ungrateful girl 
that she was) she became, at the suggestion of her 
handsome and charming brother Edgar, whom she 
adored, the willing messenger of Dan Cupid, and furth- 



68 THE DREAMER 

ered much secret and sentimental correspondence be- 
tween the innocent-seeming girls and the young scamps 
who admired them. 

In these fascinating flights into the realms of flirta- 
tion^ as in other things, Edgar's friends acknowledged 
his superiority — his romantic personal beauty and his 
gift for rhyming giving him a decided advantage over 
them all; but they acknowledged it without jealousy, 
for there was much of hero worship in their attitude 
toward him, and they were not only perfectly contented 
foi him to be first in every way but it would have dis- 
appointed them for him not to be. The captivating 
charm of his presence, in his gay moods, made it un- 
alloyed happiness for them to be with him. They were 
always ready to follow him as far as he led in daring 
adventure — ready to fetch and carry for him and glow- 
ing with pride at the least notice from him. 

Some boys would have taken advantage of this state 
of things, but not so Edgar Goodfellow. He, for his 
part, was always ready to contribute to their pleasure, 
and fairly sunned himself in the unstinting love and 
praise of these boys who admired, while but half divin- 
ing his gifts. Their games had twice the zest when 
Eddie played with them — he threw himself into the 
sport with such heartfelt zeal that they were inspired 
to do their best. Many a ramble in the w^oods and 
fields around Eichmond he took with them, telling 
them the most wonderful stories as he went along; but 
sometimes, quite suddenly, during these outings, Edgar 
Goodfellow would give place to Edgar the Dreamer and 
they would wonderingly realize that his thoughts were 



THB DREAMER 69 

off to a world where none of them could follow — none 
of them unless it were Rob Sully, who was himself some- 
thing of a dreamer, and could draw as well as Edgar. 

The transformation would be respected. His com- 
panions would look at him with something akin to awe 
in their eyes and tell each other in low tones not to 
disturb Eddie, he was " making poetry/' and confine 
their chatter to themselves, holding rather aloof from 
the young poet, who wandered on with the abstracted 
gaze of one walking in sleep — with them, but not of 
them. 

There were other, less frequent, times when his mood 
was as much respected, when added to the awe there 
was somewhat of distress in their attitude toward him. 
At these times he was not only abstracted, but a deep 
gloom would seem to have settled upon his spirit. With- 
out apparent reason, melancholy claimed him, and 
though he was still gentle and courteous, they had a 
nameless sort of fear of him — he was so unlike other 
boys and it seemed such a strange thing to be unhappy 
about nothing. It was positively uncanny. 

At these times they did not even try to be with him. 
They knew that he could wrestle with what he called 
his " blue devils " more successfully alone. A restless- 
ness generally accompanied the mood, and he would 
wander off by himself to the churchyard, the river, or 
the woods ; or spend whole long, golden afternoons shut 
up in his room, poring over some quaint old tale, or 
writing furiously upon a composition of his own. Wlien 
he looked at the boys, he did not seem to see them, but 
would gaze beyond them— the pupils of his full, soft, 



70 THE DREAMER 

grey eyes darkening and dilating as if they were held 
by some weird vision invisible to all eyes save his own; 
and indeed the belief was general among his friends 
that he was endowed with the power of seeing visions. 
This impression had been made even npon his old 
" Mammy," when he was a mite of a lad. Many a time, 
when he turned that abstracted gaze upon her, she had 
said to him, 

"What dat you lookin' at now, Honey? You is 
bawn to see evil sho' ! " 

And now a glimpse of Edgar Goodfellowi — the 
normal Edgar, whom his chums saw oftenest and loved 
best, because they knew him best and understood him 
best. 

It was a late Autumn Saturday — one of the Satur- 
days sent from Heaven for the delight of school-chil- 
dren — bracing, but not cold; and brilliant. Little 
Eobert Sully looked pensively out of the window think- 
ing what a fine day it would be for a country tramp, 
if only he were like other boys and could take them. 
But Eob was of frail build and constitution and could 
never stand much exertion. In his eyes was the expres- 
sion of settled wistfulness that frequent disappointment 
will bring to the eyes of a delicate child; in the droop 
of his mouth there was a touch of bitterness, for he 
was thinking that not only did his weak body make it 
impossible for him to keep up with the boys, but that 
it was no doubt, a relief to the boys to leave him be- 
hind — that when he could be with them he was perhaps 
a drag on their pleasure. No doubt they would make 



THE DREAMER 71 

a long day of it, this bright, bracing Saturday, for the 
persimmons and the fox-grapes were ripe and the chin- 
quapin and chestnut burrs were opening. Tears of self- 
pity sprang to his eyes, but they were quickly dashed 
away as he heard his name called and saw his beloved 
Eddie, flushed and glowing with anticipated pleasure, 
at the gate. 

" Come along, Rob," he was calling. " We are going 
to the Hermitage woods for chinquapins, and you must 
come too. Uncle Billy is going for a load of pine-tags, 
and we can ride in his wagon, so it won^t tire you." 

The other boys were waiting at the corner, all at the 
highest pitch of mirth, for they saw that their idol, 
Eddie, was in one of his happiest moods, which would 
mean a morning of unbounded fun to them. And 
the ride with old Uncle Billy who, with black and shiny 
face, beaming upon them in an excess of kindliness, 
hair like a full-blown cotton-boll, and quaint talk, was 
an unfailing source of delight to them! 

The Saturday freedom was in their blood. Off and 
away they went in the jolly, rumbling wagon, past 
houses and gardens, and fields and into the enchanting, 
autumn-colored woods, where " Bob Whites " were call- 
ing to each other and nuts were dropping in the rustl- 
ing leaves or waiting to be shaken from their open 
burrs. 

As they jolted along, the steady stream of conversa- 
tion between Edgar and Uncle Billy was as good as a 
play to the rest of the boys— Edgar, with grave, courte- 
ous manner, discoursing of "cunjurs" and "ha'nts" 
with as real an air of belief as that of the old man 
himself. 



n THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER VIL 



The allegiance of his little band of boon companions 
was all the sweeter to the young poet because he realized 
more and more fully as the years of his school-days 
passed that for some reason unknown to himself he was 
systematically, and plainly with intention, denied in- 
timacy with Nat Howard and his followers — snubhed. 
As has been said, they did not hesitate to acknowledge 
his success in all sorts of mental and physical trials of 
skill, but in a formal, impersonal way. There was 
never the least familiarity in their intercourse with 
him. This, naturally, produced in him a reserve in his 
manner toward them that they unreasonably attributed 
to " airs." Their coldness wounded and chilled the sen- 
sitive boy as much as the love of his devoted adherents 
warmed him. 

It was not until near the end of his third session in 
the school that the riddle was, quite suddenly, solved. 
Edgar Poe was now in his fifteenth year. One perfect 
May day, when the song of birds, the odors of flowers, 
the whisper of soft breezes and the langor of mellow 
sunshine outside of the open school windows were woo- 
ing all poetic souls to come out and live, and let musty, 
dry books go to the deuce, little Rob Sully found it im- 
possible to fix his mind upon his Latin. As for Edgar's 
mind, it was plain from his expression that it was far 
afield; but then Edgar had the power of knowing his 
lessons intuitively, almost. Rob only "got" his by 



TEE DREAMER 73 

faithful plodding. "^Tien their respective classes were 
called, Edgar recited brilliantly, while Rob seemed like 
one befuddled and, making a dismal failure, was bid- 
den to stay in and study at recess. A look of utter woe 
settled upon his thin, pallid face, which lifted as, im- 
pelled to look toward Edgar's desk, he caught his 
friend's eyes fixed upon him with their charming smile. 
He knew well what the eyes were saying: 

"Don't worry, Rob, I'll stay in and help you." 

And stay in the owner of the eyes did, patiently going 
over and over the lesson with the confused boy until 
the hard parts were made easy. Finally, when he saw 
that Rob had mastered it, Edgar walked out into the 
yard for the few minutes left of recess. The boys were 
all drawn up in a group a little way from the house and 
were being harangued by his rival, Nat Howard. His 
chums, Rob Stanard, Dick Ambler and Jack Preston, 
were standing together a few feet apart from the rest. 
Their faces were very red and the haranguing seemed 
to be addressed directly to them. Edgar stopped where 
he was, wondering what" it was all about, but shy of 
joining a crowd over which Nat was presiding. 

The speaker's voice rose to a higher key. 

" I'll tell you, boys," he was saying, " if you persist 
in intimacy with this fellow, you needn't expect to be 
in with me and my crowd." 

"We don't want you and your crowd," was the re- 
sponse. " He's worth all of you rolled into one." 

Edgar's heart stood still. "Was Nat Howard talking 
about himV 

The voice went on : "I grant you the fellow's smart 



74 THE DREAMER 

enough and game enough, but he's not in our class, and 
I, for one, won't associate with him intimately." 

" His family's one of the oldest and most honorable 
in the country," said Eobert Stanard. " I've heard 
my father say so." 

" Yes, but his father must have been a black sheep 
to run away with a common actress — " 

The harangue was brought to an abrupt end. The 
enraged Edgar had sprung forward and, with a blow 
in the face, struck Nat Howard down, l^at's friends 
were lifting him up and wiping the blood from his face 
and dusting his clothing, while Edgar's own friends 
gathered around him as if to restrain him from repeat- 
ing the attack. He shook them off, gazing with con- 
tempt upon his limp and half-stunned adversary. 

" I'll not hit him again until he repeats his offence," 
he assured the boys, " but I want him and all other 
cowardly dogs to know what's waiting for them when 
they insult the memory of my father and mother. Yes ! 
my mother was an actress ! God gave her the gifts to 
m.ake her one and she had the pluck to use them to 
earn bread for herself and for her children. Yes ! she 
was an actress ! She had the lovely face and form, the 
high intelligence and the poetic soul for the making of 
a perfect woman or for the interpreter of genius — 
for the personification of a Juliet, a Rosalind or a Cor- 
delia. Yes ! she was an actress ! And I'm proud of it 
as surely as I'm proud she's an angel in Heaven ! And 
I'm proud that my father — the son of a proud family — 
had the spirit, for her sweet sake, to fly in the face of 
convention, to count family, fortune and all well lost 



THE DREAMER 75 

to become her husband, and to adopt her profession; 
to learn of her, in order that he might be alwa3^s at her 
side to protect her and to live in the light of her pres- 
ence. If I had choice of all the surnames and of all 
the lineage in the world, I would still choose the name 
of Poe, and to be the son of David and Elizabeth Poe, 
players ! '' 

The boys were silent. The school bell was ringing 
and Edgar Poe, still pale and trembling with passion, 
turned on his heel and strode, with head up, in the 
direction of the door. Eob Stanard and Eob Sully 
walked one on each side of him, while Dick Ambler and 
Jack Preston and several others among his adherents, 
followed close. A little way behind the group came 
the other boys, their still half-dazed leader in their 
midst. Good Mr. Burke (who had succeeded Mr. 
Clarke as school-master) guessed as they came in and 
took their seats that there had been an altercation of 
some kind, and that his two brag scholars had been 
prominent in it; but he was wise in his generation and 
allowed the boys to settle their own differences with- 
out asking any questions unless he were appealed to, 
when his sympathy and interest were found to be theirs 
to count upon. 

The afternoon session was unsatisfactor}^, but the 
master was in an indulgent mood and apparently did 
not notice what each boy felt — a confusion and abstrac- 
tion. There was a palpable sense of relief when the 
closing hour came. 

At dinner that day Edgar was silent and evidently 



76 THE DREAMER 

under a cloud, and scarcely touched his food. Frances 
Allan looked toward him anxiously and her husband 
suspiciously. When his lack of appetite was remarked 
upon, he, truthfully enough, pleaded headache. Mrs. 
Allan was all sympathy at once. 

" You study too hard, dear," she said. '^ You may 
have a holiday tomorrow if you like, and go and spend 
the day in the country with Eosalie and the Macken- 
zies.'^ 

" No, no," replied the boy. " Fll just stay quiet, in 
my room, this evening. I'll be all right by tomorrow." 

" What have you been eating ? " demanded John 
Allan, gruffly. 

" ISTothing, since breakfast. Sir," was the reply. 

" Headaches are for nervous women. When a healthy 
boy complains of one, and declines dinner, it generally 
means that he has been robbing somebody's strawberry 
patch or up a cherry-tree, stuffing half-ripe fruit," he 
said in the acid, suspicious tone that the boy knew. It 
was beyond John Allan's powers to imagine any but 
physical causes for a boy's ailments. 

N'ot until the door of his own little bed-room was 
closed behind him did Edgar Poe even try to collect his 
thoughts. Then he sat down at his window and looked 
out' over the fragrant garden to the quiet sky, contem- 
plation of which had so often soothed his spirit, and 
tried to readjust the inner world he lived in, in accord- 
ance with the discovery he had just made. A first such 
readjustment his world had experienced three years 
before, when Mr. Allan had taunted him with his de- 



TEE DREAMER 77 

pendence upon charity. Before tliat time the world, 
as he knew it, had held only love and beauty — sorrow, 
as he had seen it, being but a solemn and poetic form 
of beauty. The change in such a world made by the 
discovery that his being an adopted son set him apart 
in a class different from other boys — a class unlovely 
and loveless — had been great, had stolen much of the 
joy from living; but he was very young then, and the 
joy of mere living and breathing was strong in his 
blood, and he had gradually become accustomed — hard- 
ened, if you will — to the idea of his dependence upon 
charity. 

But here was a change far more terrible, and coming 
at a time when he was old enough to feel it far more 
keenly. He was indeed, in a class by himself — he was 
held in contempt because of what his angel mother 
had been! His holy of holies had been profaned, the 
sacred fire that warmed his inner life had been spat 
upon. It seemed he had been from the beginning de- 
spised, though he had not dreamed it, for that which he 
held most dear — of which he was most proud. The 
little, aristocratic, puffed-up world he lived in would 
doubtless always despise him; but that was because of 
its narrowness and ignorance for which he, in turn, 
would despise it. With the whimsical, half-belief he 
had always had that the dead remain conscious through 
their long sleep, he wondered if his beautiful young 
mother, with the roses on her hair, down under the 
green earth, was not aware of the love and loyalty of 
her boy and if her spirit soaring the highest heavens, 
would not aid him in carrying out the resolution which 



78 THE DREAMER 

in the bitterness of his soul, he then and there made — 
the resolution to bring this mean little, puffed up world 
to do honor to his name — to her name, of which he was 
prouder in this hour when others would trample it in 
the dust than he had ever been before. 

Young boy though he was, he was conscious of his 
God-given endowments. He felt that the divine fire 
of poetic feeling in his breast was an immortal thing. 
Up to this time, his singing had been as the singing 
of a wood-bird — an impulse, a necessity to express the 
thoughts and feelings of his heart. He had never looked 
far enough ahead to consider whether he should or 
should not publish his work ; but now ambition awoke — 
full-grown at its birth — and set him afire. From those 
parents whose memory had been insulted he had re- 
ceived (God willing it) the precious heritage of bril- 
liant intellect. He would put the work of this intel- 
lect — his stories and his poems — into books. He would 
give them to the wide world. He would win recognition 
for the name of Poe. 

He drew from within his coat the miniature of his 
mother — her dying gift. He gazed upon it long and 
tenderly, and with it still exposed to view brought from 
his desk the little packet of yellowed letters in their 
faded blue ribbon. He knew them by heart, but he read 
them — each one — over again, as caref uly as if it' had 
been the first time. They were not many and those not 
long; but ah, they were sweet! — those tender, quaint 
love-letters that had passed between his parents in their 
brief courtship and married life. His father^s so manly 
so strong — like the letters of a soldier. His mother's 



TEE DREAMER 79 

so modest, so tender. They did not stir his pulses so 
wildly now as they did upon his first reading of them, 
when a little lad at old Stoke-Newington — but they 
were no less beautiful to him now than then. The sen- 
tences made him think of the dainty, sweet aroma of 
pressed roses. 

He tied the packet up again and kissed letters and 
picture, as if to seal the promise he was making them, 
then restored them to their hiding-places. With 
the bitter knowledge that had come to him, he 
felt that years had passed over him — that he would 
never be young again — this boy of fourteen! 

He raised his deep, pensive eyes once more to the 
quiet sky and his spirit cried to Heaven to grant him 
power to accomplish this task he had set himself : to lift 
the loved name of his parents from the dust where it 
lay, and to set it high in the temple of fame, wreathed 
with immortal myrtle. 

His resolution gave to his poetic face and his slender 
figure an air of mastery, as though some new, high 
quality had been born within him. 



80 THE DEEAMEB 



CHAPTER VIII. 

In the days that followed, Edgar's friends found him 
"unusually silent, yet not morose. Serenity sat on his 
broad, thoughtful brow and in his great, soft eyes. Nat 
Howard and his chums gave him the cold shoulder and 
wore, in his presence, the air of offended dignity which 
the small-minded are apt to assume when conscious of 
being in the wrong or of having committed an injury 
which the victim has received with credit and the offen- 
der has not forgiven. It is so much easier to grant par- 
don for an injury received than for one given ! 

Edgar's own friends were more emphatic in their de- 
votion to him than ever — racking their young brains for 
ways in which to show their loyalty and frequently 
looking into his face with the expression of soft adora- 
tion and trust one sees in the eyes of a faithful dog. 
Edgar was touched and gratified, and his sweet, spon- 
taneous smile often rewarded their efforts; but his face 
would soon become grave again and the boys were aware 
that the mind of their gifted friend was busy with 
thoughts in which they had no part. This gave them 
an impression of distance between them and him. He 
all of a sudden, seemed to have become remote, as though 
a chasm, by what power they knew not, had opened be- 
tween them — making their love for him as "the desire 
of the moth for the star." They knew that he was more 
often than ever before working upon his poetical and 



TEE DREAMER 81 

other compositions, but these were seldom shown, or 
even mentioned, to them. 

Each boy in his own way sought to bridge the gulf 
that separated them from their idol. Robert Sully 
missed his Latin lesson on purpose in the hope that 
Eddie would stay in and help him. And Eddie did, 
but wore that same detached air in which there was no 
intimacy or comfort. When the lesson was learned 
Edgar took a slate from the desk before them, rubbed 
off the problem that was upon it, and quickly wrote 
down a little poem of several stanzas. He held it out, 
with a smile, to Rob, telling' him that while teaching 
him his lesson he had been practicing " dividing his 
mind,^^ and that while one part of his brain had been 
putting English into Latin the other part had com- 
posed the verses on the slate. 

The dumfounded Rob read the verses aloud, but be- 
fore he could express his amazement Edgar had taken 
the slate from him and, with one swipe of the damp 
spunge, obliterated the rhymes. 

"Write them on paper for me, please,^^ plead Robert. 

The brilliant smile of the boy-poet flashed upon him. 
" Oh, they were not worth keeping," said he, indiffer- 
ently. " They were merely an exercise." And picking 
up his books and hat, he walked out of the door, whist- 
ling in clear, high, plaintive notes one of the melodies 
of his favorite Tom Moore. 

The boy left behind looked after him with a troubled 
heart and misty eyes. This wonderful friend of his 
was as kind as ever, yet he seemed changed. It was 
clear that he had " something on his mind." 



82 THE DREAMER 

"Will you go swimming with me this evening, 
Eddie?" said Dick Ambler one day when school was 
out. 

"With all the pleasure in life/' was the hearty re- 
sponse. 

Dick went home to his dinner with a singing heart. 
If anything could bring Edgar down from the clouds to 
his own level, surely it would be bathing together. He 
certainly could not make poetry while diving and swim- 
ming, naked, in the racing and tumbling falls of James 
River. A merry battle with those energetic waters kept 
a fellow's wits as well as his muscles fully occupied. 

But even this attempt was a failure. If Edgar made 
any poetry while in the water he did not mention it; 
but he was absent-minded and unsociable all the way to 
the river and back — sky-gazing for curious cloud-forms, 
listening for bird-notes and hunting wild-flowers, and 
talking almost none at all. 

In the water he seemed to wake up, and never dived 
with more grace, or daring; but no sooner had they 
started on the way home than he was off with his 
dreams again. 

Rob Stanard was more successful in his attempts to 
interest his friend. In spite of their intimacy at school 
and on the playground Edgar had up to this time never 
visited the Stanard home. Rob had enlisted his mother's 
sympathy in the orphan boy and she had suggested that 
he should invite Edgar home with him some day. It 
now occurred to Rob that this would be a good time to 
do so, and knowing his friend's fondness for dumb 



THE DREAMER 83 

animals, he offered his pets as an attraction — asking him 
to come and see his pigeons and rabbits. His invita- 
tion was accepted with alacrity. 

Edgar had seen Rob's mother, but only at a distance. 
He knew her reputation as one of the town beauties, 
but lovely women were not rare in Richmond, and, 
beauty-worshipper though he was, he had never had any 
especial curiosity in regard to Mrs. Stanard. He was 
altogether unprepared for the vision that broke upon 
him. 

Instead of going through the house, Rob had piloted 
him by way of a side gate, directly into the walled 
garden, sweet and gay with roses, lilies and other flow- 
ers of early June. 

Mrs. Stanard, who took almost as much pleasure in 
her children's pets as they did, was standing near a 
clump of arbor-vitae, holding in her hands a " willow- 
ware " plate from which the pigeons were feeding. She 
was at this time, though the mother of Edgar's twelve- 
year-old chum, not thirty years of age, and her pensive 
beauty was in its fullest flower. Against the sombre 
background the arbor-vitae made, her slight figure, clad 
in soft, clinging white, seemed airy and sylphlike. Her 
dark, curling hair, girlishly bound with a ribbon snood, 
and her large brown eyes, were in striking contrast to 
her complexion, which was pale, with the radiant and 
warm palor of a tea-rose or a pearl. Her features were 
daintily modelled, and like slender lilies were the hands 
holding the deep blue plate from which the pigeons— 



84 THE DREAMER 

white, grey and bronze, fed — fluttering about her with 
soft cooings. 

The picture was so much more like a poet's dream 
than a reality, that the boy-poet stepped back, with an 
exclamation of surprise. 

" It is only my mother," explained Eob. " She'll be 
glad to see you." 

The next moment she had perceived the boys, and 
with quick impulse, set the plate upon the ground and 
came forward, and before a word of introduction could 
be spoken, had taken the visitor's hand between both 
her own fair palms, holding it thus, with gentle, grac- 
ious pressure, in a pretty, cordial way she had, while 
she greeted him. 

The soft eyes that rested on his face filled with kind- 
ness and welcome. 

" So this is my Rob's friend," she was saying, in a 
low, musical voice. "Rob's mother is delighted to see 
you for his sake and for your own too, Edgar, for I 
greatly admired ijour gifted mother. I saw her once 
only, when I was a young girl, but I can never forget 
her lovely face and sweet, plaintive voice. It was one of 
the last times she ever acted, and she was ill and pale, 
but she was exquisitely beautiful and made the most 
charming Juliet. She interested me more than any 
actress I have ever seen." 

Edgar Poe longed to fall down and kiss her feet — ■ 
to worship her. Her beauty, her gentleness and her 
gracious words so stirred his soul that he grew faint. 
Power of speech almost left him, and, vastly to his 



THE DREAMER 85 

humiliation^ he could with difficulty control his voice to 
utter a few stumbling words of thanks — ^he who was 
usually so ready of speech ! 

If she noticed his confusion she did not appear to 
do so. Her heart had been touched by all she had 
heard from her son of the lonely boy, and she had also 
been interested in accounts of his gifts that had come to 
her from various sources. The beauty, the poetry, the 
pensiveness of his face moved her deeply — knowing his 
history and divining the lack of sympathy one of his bent 
would probably find in the Allan home, for all its in- 
dulgences. 

She sat on a garden-bench and talked to him for a 
time, in her gentle, understanding way, and then, not 
vdshing to be a restraint upon the boys, (after placing 
her husband's fine library at Edgar's disposal, and urging 
him to come often to see Eob) withdrew into the house. 

The motherless boy looked after her until she had 
disappeared, and stared at the door that had closed 
upon her until he was recalled from his reverie by the 
voice of his friend, suggesting that they now see the 
rabbits. Edgar looked at the gentle creatures with 
unseeing eyes, though he appeared to be listening to 
the prattle of his companion concerning them. Sud- 
denly, in a voice filled with enthusiasm and with a 
touch of awe in it, he said: 

" Eob, your mother is divinely beautiful — and good.'* 

'"Bully," was the nonchalant reply. "The best 
thing about her is the way she takes up for a fellow 



86 THE DREAMER 

when he brings in a bad report or gets into a scrape. 
Fathers always think it's their sons' fault, yon know." 

Edgar flushed. ''Bully — '' he said to himself, with 
a shudder. The adjective applied to her seemed blas- 
phemy. 

Aloud, he said, '^ She's an angel ! She's the one I've 
always dreamed about." 

" You dreamed about mother when you had never 
seen her ?" questioned the astonished Eob. "What 
did you dream ? " 

" Nothing, in the way you mean, I meant she is 
like my idea of a perfect woman. The kind of woman 
a man could always be good for, or would gladly die to 
serve." 

"Well, I'm not smart enough to think out things 
like that, Eddie, but Mother certainly is all right. 
What you say about her sounds nice, and she'd under- 
stand it, too. I just bet that you and mother'll be the 
best sort of cronies when you know each other better. 
She likes all those queer old books you think so fine, 
and she knows whole pages of poetry by heart. Wlien 
you and she get together it will be like two books talk- 
ing out loud to each other. I won't be able to join in 
much, but it will be as good as a play to listen." 

The young poet bent his steps homeward with but one 
thought, one hope in his heart, and that a consuming 
one: to look again upon the lovely face, to hear again 
the voice that had enthralled him, had taken his heart 
by storm and filled it with a veritable grande passion — 
the rapturous devotion of the virgin heart of an ardent 
and romantic youth. First love — 'yet so much more 



THE DREAMER 87 

than ordinary love — a pure passion of the soul, in which 
there was much of worship and nothing of desire. 
Surely the most pure and holy passion the world has 
ever known, for in it there was absolutely nothing of 
self. Like Dante after his first meeting with Beatrice, 
this Virginia boy-poet had entered upon a Vita Nuova 
— a new life — made all of beauty. 

What difference did the taunts of schoolmates, the 
hardness of a foster-father make now? The wounds 
they made had been gratefully healed by the balm of 
her beauteous words about his mother. Those old 
wounds were as nothing — neither they nor anything 
else had power to harm him now. In the new life that 
had opened so suddenly before him he would bear a 
charmed existence. 

He went to his room before the usual hour that night, 
for he wanted to be alone with his dreams — with his 
newest, most beautiful dream. To his room, but not to 
bed. Life was too beautiful to be wasted in sleep. He 
lighted his lamp and holding his mother's picture 
within its circle of light, gazed long and devotedly upon 
it. Did she know of the great light that had shone 
out of what seemed a sunless sky upon her boy? Had 
she, looking out from high Heaven, seen the gracious 
greeting of the beautiful being who was Madonna and 
Psyche in one? Had she heard her own cause so 
sweetly championed, her own name so sweetly cleared 
of opprobrium? 

He threw himself upon his lounge and lay with his 
hands clasped under his curly head, still dreaming — 



88 THE DREAMER 

dreaming — dreaming — until day-dreams were merged 
into real dreams, for he was fast asleep. 

In his sleep he saw the lady of his dreams in a 
situation of peril, from which he joyfully rescued her. 
He awoke with a start. His lamp had burned itself 
out but a late moon flooded the room with the white 
light that he loved. A breeze laden with odors caught 
from the many rose-gardens and the heavier-scented 
magnolias, now in full bloom, it had come across, 
stirred the curtain. His nostrils, always sensitive to 
the odors of flowers, drank it in rapturously. So 
honey-sweet it was, his senses swam. 

He arose and looked out upon the incense-breathing 
blossoms, like phantoms, under the moon. A clock in 
a distant part of the house was striking twelve. How 
much more beautiful was the world now — at night's 
high noon — than at the same hour of the day. 

All the house, save himself, was asleep. How easy 
it would be to escape into this lovely night — to walk 
through this ambrosial air to the house-worshipful in 
which she doubtless lay, like a closed lily-flower, clasped 
in sleep. 

A mocking-bird — the Southland's nightingale — in 
some tree or bush not far away, burst into passion- 
shaken melody that seemed to voice, as no words could, 
his own emotion. 

Down the stair he slipped, and out of the door, into 
the well-nigh intoxicating beauty of the southern 
summer's night. Indeed, the odors of the dew-drenched 
flowers — the moonlight — the bird-music, together with 



TEE DREAMER 89 

his remembrance of his lady's greeting, went to his 
head like wine. 

As he strolled along some lines of Shelley's which 
had long been favorites of his, sang in his brain: 

"I arise from dreams of thee 

In the first sweet sleep of night, 
When the winds are breathing low 

And the stars are shining bright. 
I arise from dreams of thee, 

And the spirit in my feet 
Has led me — 'Who knows how? — 

To thy chamber-window, sweet! 

"Tlie wandering airs they faint 

On the dark, the silent stream; 
The champak odors fail 

Like sweet thoughts in a dream; 
The nightingale's complaint, 

It dies upon her heart, 
As I must die on thine. 

Oh, beloved, as thou art! 

" Oh, lift me from the grass! 

I die, I faint, I fail! 
Let thy love in kisses rain 

On my lips and eyelids pale. 
My cheek is cold and white, alas! 

My heart beats loud and fast. 
Oh, press it close to thine again, 

Where it will break at last." 

The words of the latter half of this serenade were 
meaningless as applied to his case. To have quoted 
them — even mentally — in any literal sense, would 



90 TEE DREAMER 

have seemed to him profanation; yet the whole poem 
in some way not to be analysed or defined, expressed 
his mood — and who so brutal as to seek to reduce 
to common-sense the eimotions of a poet-lover, in the 
springtime of life? 

At length he was before the closed and shuttered 
house, standing silent and asleep. Opposite were the 
grassy slopes of Capitol Square — with the pillared, 
white Capitol, in its midst, looking, in the moonlight, 
like a dream of old Greece. Her house! He looked 
upon its moonlit, ivied walls with adoration. A light 
still shone from one upper room. Was it Tier chamber? 
Was she, too, awake and alive to the beauty of this 
magic night? 

His heart beat tumultuously at the thought. Then — 
Oh, wonder ! His knees trembled under him — he grew 
dizzy and was ready, indeed, to cry, " I die, I faint, I 
fail V^ She crossed the square of light the window 
made. In her uplifted hand she carried the lamp from 
which the light shone, and for a moment her slight 
figure, clad all in white as he had seen her in the 
garden a few hours before, and softly illuminated, 
was framed in the ivy-wreathed casement. But for a 
moment — then disappeared, but the trembling boy- 
lover and poet seemed to see it still, and gazed and gazed 
until the light was out and all the house dark. 

He stumbled back through the moonlight to his 
home, he crept up the creaking stair again, to his 
little, dormer-windowed room; but sleep was now, more 
than ever, impossible. 



THE DREAMER 91 

Though the lamp had gone out, a candle stood upon 
a stand at the head of his bed. He lighted it, and by- 
its ra}^, wrote, under the spell of the hour, the first 
utterance in which he, Edgar Poe, ascended from the 
plane of a maker of "promising" verse, to the realm 
of the true poet — a poem to the lady of his heart's 
dream destined (though he little guessed it) to make 
her name immortal and to send the fame of his youth- 
ful passion down the ages as one of the world's his- 
toric love-affairs. 

What was her name? he wondered. He had never 
heard it, but he would call her Helen — Helen, the 
ancient synonym of womanly beauty, but the loveliest 
Helen, he believed, that ever set poet-lover piping her 
praise. 

And so, " To Helen," were the words he wrote at the 
top of his page, and underneath the name these lines: 

" Helen, thy beauty is to me 

Lfike those Nicean barks of yore, 
That gently o'er a perfumed sea, 
The weary, wayworn wanderer bore 
To his own native shore. 

" On desperate seas long wont to roam, 

Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, 

Thy Naiad airs have brought me home 

To the glory that was Greece 
And the grandeur that was Rome. 

" Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche 
How statue-like I see thee stand! 

The agate lamp within thy hand. 
Ah! Psyche, from the regions which 

Are Holy Land! " 



92 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER IX. 

"With his meeting with " Helen," a new life, indeed, 
seemed to have opened for Edgar the Dreamer. Not 
only had her own interest and S3^mpathy been aroused, 
but her husband, a learned and accomplished judge of 
the Supreme Court of Virginia, also received him cor- 
dially and became deeply interested in him, and he 
found in their home what his own had lacked for him, 
a thoroughly congenial atmosphere. 

'^ Helen " Stanard listened kindly to his boyish rhap- 
sodies about his favorite poets, and encouraged him to 
bring her his own portefolio of verses, which he did, 
all but the ones addressed to herself — these he kept 
secret. She read all he brought her carefully, and intel- 
ligently criticised them in a way that was a real help 
to him. 

As has been said, when Mr. Allan had discovered 
that his adopted son was a rhymster, he had rebuked 
him severely for such idle waste of time, and in a vain 
attempt to clip the wings of Pegasus, threatened him 
with punishment if he should hear of such folly again. 
Mrs. Allan, on the contrary, though she was not a 
bookish woman, had protested against her husband's 
command — urging that Edgar be encouraged to culti- 
vate his talent. The ability to compose verse seemed to 
her, in a boy of Edgar's age, little short of miraculous, 
and, proud of her pet's accomplishment, she heaped 



THE DREAMER 93 

indiscriminate praise upon every line that she saw of his 
writing. 

The boy, hardly knowing which way to escape, be- 
tween these two fires that bade fair to work the ruin 
of his gift, turned eagerly to his new friend. " Helen " 
gently told him that she believed his talent to be a 
sacred trust, and that he would be committing sin to 
bury it — even though by so doing he should be ful- 
filling the wishes of his foster-father to whom he owed 
so much. He must, however, not forget his duty to 
Mr. Allan in regard to this matter, as in other things, 
but treat his views with all the consideration possible. 
Above all things, he was never to depart from the 
truth in talking to him, but to tell him in a straight- 
forward and respectful way that he believed it his 
duty when poetical thoughts presented themselves to 
his mind, to set them down, and even to encourage 
and invite such thoughts. 

At the same time, she earnestly warned him against 
being overmuch impressed by the flattering estimates 
of his work of his friends, especially of his mother, 
who was far too partial to him, personally, to be a 
safe judge of his writings. 

A happier summer than is often given mortals 
to know, Edgar the Dreamer passed at the feet of 
the lovely young matron who had become a sort of 
mother-confessor to him. Happiness which, with a 
touch of the superstition that was characteristic of 
him he often told himself was too perfect to last. 
What was it that made him feel sometimes in look- 



94 THE DREAMER 

ing upon her under the serene sky of that ideal 
summer that a cloud no bigger than a man's hand 
threw its shadow upon her? Was it that faint hint 
of sadness in her dark eyes or the ethereal radiance 
of her pale complexion that while thrilling him with 
delight in the exquisite quality of her beauty, filled 
him with foreboding? 

Ere the frosts of autumn had robbed her garden 
of its glory, blighting sorrow had fallen upon her 
tender mother-heart in the death of a darling baby 
girl. Beneath this blow the health of sweet " Helen," 
always frail, succumbed, and her home became thence- 
forth as a living tomb, in which the few who ever saw 
her again trod softly and spoke in hushed voices. 

When the earliest roses were in bloom in her garden 
two years after Edgar Poe first saw her there, she 
lay in her coffin, and for him, the world seemed to 
have come to an end. 

She was laid to rest in the new cemetery on Shockoe 
Hill, not far from the Allan home. The bier was 
followed by its black procession of mourners, and no 
one knew that the heart of a youth who followed too, 
but at a distance, was breaking. Though husband 
and children and brother and sister were bowed with 
grief, he told himself that there was among them no 
sorrow like unto his sorrow who had not even the 
right of kinship to mourn for her. Of what business 
of his (he fancied, out of the bitterness of his soul. 



THE DREAMER 95 

the world saying) of what business of his was her 
death? What business had he to mourn? 

Again his feet kept time to the old refrain of 
never, nevermore, that hammered in his brain — a re- 
frain that to the unrealizing ear of the child of three 
had been sad with a beautiful, rythmic sadness that 
was rather pleasurable than otherwise; that to the 
youth of sixteen was still musical and beautiful, 
though filled with despair. 

As at many another time his poetical gift gave him 
a merciful vent for his pent up feeling, so now it came 
to his aid, and upon the night of the day when she 
was laid to rest he poured out his sorrow in " The 
Paean " — which he was afterwards to revise and re- 
name, "Lenore" — 

"An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so 
young — 
A dirge for her, the doubly dead in that she died so 
young." 

As during his childhood, and afterwards, he had 
found a mournful pleasure in visiting the grave of his 
mother, in the churchyard on the hill; so now he 
found a blessed solace, in his terrible loneliness, in 
pilgrimages to the shrine (for as such he held the 
grave of his saint) in the new cemetery. These pil- 
grimages he usually made at night — his grief was too 
sacred a thing to be flaunted in broad daylight. Many 
a night during the spring and summer found him 
slipping down the stair, when the house was asleep. 



96 THE DREAMER 

and taking his way through the silent city of Slumber 
to that even more silent city of Death. 

Oh, that those that lay there not much more still 
than they who lay asleep in their beds in that other 
city, might arise like them with the morrow's sun! 

Often, as he walked along, drinking in the per- 
fumed night air that he loved^^ — the night breeze grate- 
fully lifting the ringlets from his fevered brow — • 
often he thought of that first summer's night when 
with the sweet words of Shelley's serenade: "I arise 
from dreams of thee," singing themselves in his heart, 
he had gone with light feet to worship beneath her 
window. 

Ah, the world was young then, for sweet hope was 
alive ! 

The iron gates of the cemetery were locked, but 
the wall was not very high. To scale it but added 
zest to his adventure. He would be a knight unfit for 
his vigil if he were to let himself be so easily balked. 

Within the wall the odors of fiowers were even 
heavier, more oppressively sweet than without, and 
the silence surpassed the silence of the outer city even 
as the stillness of the sleepers here surpassed the still- 
ness of those yonder. 

He listened and listened to the silence. Surely if 
she should speak, even from down under the ground 
he could hear her across this silence which was as a 
void — a black and terrible void. 

His first pilgrimages were by moonlight, but when 
the moonless nights came he continued his vigils. He 



TEE DREAMER 97 

would have known the way by that time with his 
eyes shut. 

Sometimes he was afraid — horribly afraid. He 
seemed, in the shadows, to descry weird phantom- 
shapes, moving stealthily; in the silence to hear ghost- 
ly whispers; sometimes he fancied he heard tUe silence 
itself! But in the very fear that clutched his throat 
there was a fascination — a lure — that made it impos- 
sible to turn back. 

His sorrow was exquisite; his terror was exquisite; 
his loneliness was oh, how exquisite! Yet in court- 
ing them all, here in the dead of night, prone on her 
grave, he found the only balm he knew — the only 
sympathy; for to his fancy the dark and the quiet had 
always seemed sentient things and he felt that they 
gave him a sympathy he did not — could not ask of 
people. 

A breathless night in July found him at the familiar 
tryst at an earlier hour than was his wont. He lay 
upon the grass at her feet with his hands clasped 
under his head and his face turned up to the stars. 
There was moonlight as well as starlight, and in its 
silvery radiance his features, always pale, had the 
frigid whiteness of marble. The wide-open eyes that 
stared upward to the stars, were larger, darker than in 
daylight, and more full of brooding; the white brow, 
with its crown of dark ringlets was whiter and more 
expansive. 

In a dormer-windowed cottage overlooking a rose 



98 THE DREAMER 

garden, on Clay Street, an erect gentleman in an un- 
compromising stock and immaculate ruffles, with nar- 
row blue eyes under a beetling brow, and a somewhat 
hawk-like nose, sharply questioned a fair and grace- 
ful lady, with an anxious expression on her flower- 
face, as to why " that boy ^' did not come home to his 
supper. But they were used by now, to the boy's 
strange, wayward whims, and so did not marvel much. 
Only — they had not seen him since the feat that had 
set the town ringing with his name and it seemed to 
them that it would have been natural for him to come 
home in the flush of his triumph and tell them about 
it. 

Edgar Poe had that day created the sensation of 
the hour by swimming from the Eichmond wharves to 
Warwick — a distance of six miles — in the midsum- 
mer sun. 

Richmond was a fair and pleasant little city in those 
days, in spite of the fact that our boy-poet found in 
it so much to make him melancholy. " The merriest 
place in America,'^ Thackeray called it some years 
later, and would probably have said the same of it 
then had he been there. The blight of Civil War 
had not touched the cheerful temper of its people; 
the tenement row had not crowded out grass and 
flowers. It was more a large village than a town, 
with gracious homes — not elbowing each other for 
foundation room, but standing comfortably apart, 
amid their green lawns, and with wide verandahs over- 
hanging their many-flowered gardens. 



THE DREAMER 99 

" After tea/' on warm nights, the houses overflowed 
into these verandahs, and there was much visiting from 
one to another — much light-hearted talk and happy 
laughter; the popular theme being whatever happened 
to be " the news." 

It was the day of contentment, for wants were mod- 
erate and plentifully supplied; the day of satisfaction 
in wholesome domestic joys; the day of hospitality 
without grudging; the day when sweetness extracted 
from little pleasures did not need spicing, for palates 
were not jaded; the day of the ideal simple life. 

Upon this night, as on other nights, young girls 
who were not yet " gone to the springs " floated along 
the fashionable promenades, in airy muslins, with 
theflr cavaliers beside them. Groups of gentlemen 
and ladies sat on the porches and children played 
hide-and-seek, chased fire-flies, or sat on the steps and 
listened to the talk of their elders. And everywhere, 
in all of the groups, the chief topic was the boy, Edgar 
Poe, and his wonderful swim. 

And the boy who had in an afternoon become, for 
the time being at least, the foremost figure in town, 
knew it, but did not care. 

To lie alone on the grass by the grave of his dead 
divinity and gaze at the far stars, and brood upon his 
young sorrows — this gave him more satisfaction than 
to be the central figure of any one of the groups sing- 
ing his praise ; filled him with a romantic despair that 
to his high-strung soul had a more delicately sweet 
flavor than positive pleasure. 



100 THE DREAMER 

As to the erect gentleman in the high stock and 
the pretty lady with the tender, anxious face — they 
had, for the present, no part in his thoughts. It was 
wrong and ungrateful of him that they should not 
have, and if he had remembered them he would have 
known that it was wrong and ungrateful ; but he would 
not have cared. And as for his food — he had supped 
royally, and without compunction, upon the fruit of an 
inviting orchard to which he had helped himself, un- 
blushingly, upon his way into town. 

A reckless mood, born of the restlessness that was in 
his blood, was upon him. 

The truth was, that poignant as was his pleasure in 
dwelling upon his poetical sorrow for the adored 
"Helen'' — his "lost Lenore" — it did not fully sat- 
isfy him. His youthful heart was hungry for response 
to his out-poured sentiment, for the more robust diet 
of mutual love. In plain English, Edgar Poe wanted, 
and wanted badly, a sweetheart, though he did not 
suspect it. 

When, finally, he scaled the cemetery wall and took 
his way homeward he did not go directly to the dormer- 
windowed cottage where the erect gentleman and the 
pretty lady awaited him. Just as he was approach- 
ing it he heard Elmira Eoyster's guitar in the porch 
opposite, and he crossed the street and entered the 
Eoyster's gate. 

The Eoysters and Allans had been neighbors for 
years and he and Elmira had been "brought up to- 



THE DREAMER 101 

gether.'^ At the sound of approaching footsteps the 
guitar grew suddenly silent and a slight, rather color- 
less girl in a white dress, with a white flower in her 
fluffy blonde hair, came from out the shadow of the 
microphilla rose that embowered the porch and stood 
in the full light of the moon, giving him greeting. 

'^ Oh, I'm so glad to see you, Eddie,'' she said. All 
of the family but me have gone to a party, and I'm so 
lonesome! Besides, I, like everybody else in town, 
want a chance to congratulate you." 

"Congratulate?" he replied, with a shrug, as he 
took a seat beside her, under the roses, " Congratulate ? 
In their hearts they all despise me." Then with a 
smile, 

"You see the blue devils have the upper hand of 
me tonight, Myra." 

"Well, they are fibbing devils if they tell you you 
are despised. Dick Ambler was over at your house 
looking for you a little while ago, and he stopped by 
and told me about your swim. He said he and the 
other boys that followed you in the boat had never 
seen anything so exciting in their lives. They were 
expecting you to give out any minute and so much 
afraid that if you did you would go under before they 
could get hold of you. When you won the wager they 
were so proud and happy that they were almost beside 
themselves." 

" Oh, I know Dick and the rest are the best and 
truest friends a fellow ever had — bless their hearts — 
but they are the exceptions." 



102 THE DREAMER 

'^ Nonsense ! There's not a boy in town tonight who 
would not give his head to be in your shoes, and" 
(shyly) "the girls are all wild about you." 

The hero smiled indulgently. No woman was ever 
thrown with Edgar Poe, from his birth up, but in some 
fashion or degree, loved him, and to him all women 
were angels. He never, as boy or man, entertained a 
thought or wrote a line of one of them that was not 
reverent. He admired, in varying degree, all types 
of feminine loveliness, but Myra, though he liked her, 
was not the style that he most cared for. He had always 
thought her too " washed out." The soul that shone 
through her rather prominent, light-blue eyes was too 
transparent, too easily read. He found more inter- 
esting the richer-hued brunette type, and the complex 
nature that goes with it; the flashes of starlight, the 
softness and the warmth, of brown eyes; the mysteries 
that lie in the shadow of dusky lashes; the variety of 
rich, warm tones in chestnut and auburn tresses. 

But Myra was a revelation to him tonight. He 
had never dreamed that she could look so pretty — so 
very pretty — as she did now in her white dress, with 
the moonlight filtering through the foliage upon her 
fair hair and her face (turned full of liking and un- 
disguised admiration upon him) and her lovely arms, 
bared to the elbow. She had an ethereal, fairy-like 
appearance that was bewitching, and in his despondent 
mood, her frank praise was more than sweet. Still 
his answer was as bitter as ever, 

" Oh, well, what does it all amount to ? They would 



TEE DREAMER 103 

say the same of any acrobat in a circus whose joints 
were a bit more limber than those of the rest of his 
tribe. That does not remove their contempt for me, 
personally." 

'' I don't feel contempt for you, Eddie," she gently 
replied — just breathing it. 

(Myra was really wonderful tonight. He had not 
known her voice could have so much color in it; and 
the white flower in her hair — a cape-jessamine, its 
excessively sweet fragrance told him — gave her pale 
beauty the touch of romance it had always lacked). 
The poetic eyes that looked into hers mellowed, the 
C5mical voice softened: 

*^^ Don't you Myra? Well, you'd better cultivate it. 
Its the fashion, and it's the only feeling I'm worth." 

" Eddie," she said earnestly — tenderly, " I want 
you to promise me that you won't talk that way any 
more — at least not to me — it hurts me." 

Her hand, on his sleeve, was as fair as a petal from 
the jessamine flower in her hair. He took it gently in 
his. 

" Dear little Myra, little playmate — " he said. 
"You are my friend, I know, and have been since 
we were mere babies, in spite of knowing, as you do, 
what a naughty, idle, disobedient boy I've been, de- 
serving every flogging and scolding I've gotten and 
utterly unworthy all the good things that have come 
my way — including your dear friendship." 

" You are breaking your promise already," she 



104 THE DREAMER 

said. '^You shall not run yourself down to me. I 
think you are the nicest boy in town ! '' 

There was nothing complex about Myra. Her mind 
was an open book, and he suddenly found he liked it 
so — liked it tremendously. Her unveiled avowal of 
preference for him was most soothing to his restless, 
dissatisfied mood. 

"Thank you, Myra/' he said tenderly, kissing the 
flower-petal hand before he laid it down. He had a 
strong impulse to kiss her, but resisted it, with an 
effort, and abruptly changed the subject. 

" Did you know that we are going to move ? '^ he 
asked. "And that I'm going to the University next 
winter ? " 

" To move ? " she questioned, aghast. " Where ? " 

" To the Gallego mansion, at Fifth and Main Streets. 
Mr. Allan has bought it. The dear little mother, who, 
I'd say, if you'd let me, is so much better to me than 
I deserve, is full of plans for furnishing it and is 
going to fit up a beautiful room in it for me. It will 
be a delightful home for us, and quite grand after 
our modest cottage, but do you know I'm goose enough 
to be homesick at the thought of giving up my little 
den under the roof? Myself and I have had such jolly 
times together in it ! " 

She had scarcely heard him, except the first words 
and the stunning facts they contained. There was 
a minute's silence, then she spoke in a changed, quiv- 
ering voice. 

" Then that will be the end of our friendship, I 



THE DREAMER 105 

suspect! When you get out of the neighborhood, and 
are off most of the time at the University, we will 
doubtless see little more of you." 

Her clear blue eyes were shining up at him through 
tears. Her mouth was tremulous as a distressed 
child^s. The appeal met an instant response from the 
tender-hearted poet. Both the flower-like hands were 
captured this time, and held fast, in spite of their 
fluttering. The excessively sweet fragrance of the 
blossom in her hair was in his nostrils. Her quick, 
short breaths told him of the tempest in her tender 
young bosom. 

"Myra, little Myra, do you care like that?" he 
cried. " Then let the friendship go, and be my dear 
little sweetheart, won't you? I'm dying of loneliness 
and the want of somebody to love and to love me — 
somebody who understands me — and you do, don't 
you, Myra, darling?" 

She was too happy to answer, but she suffered him 
to put his arms around her and kiss her soft pale hair 
— and her brow — and her tremulous mouth — the first 
kisses of love to him as well as to her. And ah, how 
sweet ! 

He laughed happily, lifted out of his gloom by this 
new, this deliriously sweet dream. 

"Do you know, little sweetheart," he said, in a 
voice that was bubbling with joy, "I feel that you 
have cast those devils out of me forever. It was you 
that I wanted all the time, and did not know it. Some 
of these days, when I've been through college and set- 



106 THE DREAMER 

tied down, we will be married, and wherever our home 
is, we must always have a porch like this, with a rose 
on it, and" (kissing her brow) "you must always 
wear a jessamine in your hair." 

And so the boy-poet and his girl play-mate, very 
much to their own surprise, parted affianced lovers, 
and a long vista of sunlit days seemed to beckon The 
Dreamer. 



TEE DREAMER 107 



CHAPTEE X. 



The session at the University did not begin until 
the middle of February, so love's young dream was 
not to be interrupted too soon. Meantime, its sweet- 
ness was only enhanced by thought of the coming 
separation. The affair had too, the interest of secrecy, 
for the youthful lovers well knew the storm of opposi- 
tion that would be raised, in both their homes, if it 
should be discovered. This need of secrecy made 
frequent meetings and exchange of vows impossible, 
but it gave to such as occurred the flavor of stolen 
sweets and kept the young sinners in a tantalized state 
which was excruciating and at the same time delight- 
ful, and which still further fed the flames and con- 
vinced them of the realness and intensity of their 
passion. 

When they did meet, their awed, joyous confes- 
sions of mutual love charmed the lonely, romantic boy 
by their very novelty. In them his fairest dreams 
were fulfilled. How sweet it was in these rare, stolen 
moments, to crush the pure young creature, who would 
be his own some day, against his wildly beating heart — 
how passing sweet to hear against his ear her whis- 
pered, hesitating vows of deep, everlasting love! 

In his pretty new room overlooking the terraced 
garden of the stately mansion which had become his 
home, Edgar Poe plunged headlong into Byron, and 



108 THE DREAMER 

in the mood thus induced, penned many a verse, no 
worse and not much better than the rhymes of love- 
lorn youths the world over and time out of mind, to be 
copied into Myra's album. 

Between the love-malting and preparation for col- 
lege, time took wings. In what seemed an incredibly 
short space summer and fall were gone, Christmas, 
with its festivities, was over and the new year — the 
year 1826 — had opened. 

It was upon St. Valentine's Day that, with a feel- 
ing of solemnity worthy of the act, the seventeen year 
old lover and student wrote the name Edgar Allan 
Poe, and the date of his birth, upon the matricula- 
tion book of the University of Virginia — open for its 
second session. Upon the day before the beauty and 
the poetry — the inspiration — of the place had burst 
Upon him, and this first impression still held his soul 
in thrall. 

Here, in this fair Virginia vale, ringed about with 
the heaven-kissing hills of the Blue Eidge, the schol- 
astic village conjured by Jefferson's fertile imagination 
lay before him in the clear, winter sunshine. Its 
lawns and its gardens were just now white with an 
unbroken blanket of new-fallen snow; the young trees 
which had been planted in avenues along the lawns, 
but which were as yet hardly more than shrubs, glit- 
tered with icicles, and above them rose the classic 
columns of the colonnaded dormitories and professors' 
houses; while at one end of the oblong square the 
majestic dome and columns of the Eotunda stood out 



THE DREAMER 109 

against the sky. As the entranced Dreamer gazed and 
gazed, trying to imagine what it must be like by 
moonlight — what it would be in spring — what (a 
few years later, when the trees should have grown 
large enough to arch the walks) in summer — he told 
himself that surely in this garden-spot of the Old 
Dominion, bricks and mortar had sprung into im- 
mortal bloom, and he found himself quoting a line of 
his own: 

"The glory that was Greece and the grandeur that 
was Rome/' 

Upon his earliest opportunity he sat down and wrote 
Myra a rhapsody upon it all. Her presence, he felt, 
and he wrote her, was all needed to make the place a 
paradise. 

Under his name upon the matriculation book he 
had written, with confidence: 

"Schools of Ancient and Modern Languages." In 
the school of Ancient Languages were taught (accord- 
ing to the announcement for the year) "Hebrew, 
rhetoric, belles-lettres ancient history and geography;'' 
in the school of Modern Languages, " French, Spanish, 
Italian, Grerman, and the English language in its 
Anglo Saxon form; also modern history and modern 
geography." A list, one would think, to daunt the 
courage of a seventeen year old student and make him 
feel that he had the world on his shoulders. 

It was quite the contrary with The Dreamer. He 
felt instead that he had suddenly developed wings. 



110 THE DREAMER 

Learning came easy to him. He was already a good 
French and Latin scholar^ and the rest did not fright- 
en him. Not only was he not in the least burdened by 
thought of the work he was cutting out for himself, 
but he was elated by a sense of freedom such as he 
had never known before. Always before, both at 
home and at school, he had been under surveillance. 
But now he was to be a partaker of the benefits of 
Mr. Jefferson's theories of the treatment of students 
as men and gentlemen — letting their conduct be a 
matter of noblesse oblige. 

In the youth of seventeen this sudden withdrawal of 
oversight and regulation produced an exhilaration that 
was indeed pleasurable. Among the unfrequented 
hills known as the ^^ Kagged Mountains/' not far away, 
was a wild and romantic region that invited him to 
fascinating exploration — perhaps adventure. Instead 
of having to beg permission or to steal off upon the 
solitary rambles which he loved, to this enchanting 
country, he could, and did, go when he chose, openly, 
and with no questions asked or rebukes given. 

He held up his head with a new confidence at the 
thought, and took his dreams of ambition and love, 
whenever he could allow himself time to do so, to 
the enticing new region (as unlike anything around 
Richmond as if it were in a different world) adjacent 
to which, for the time, his lot lay. 

He did not neglect his classes, however. They were 
regularly attended and his standing was excellent; 
so the professors had no cause for making inquiry 



TEE DREAMER HI 

into the pursuits of his private hours. The library, 
too, in the beautiful Eotunda, was a new, if different, 
field for his exploration and one that gave him great 
delight, for he found there many volumes of quaint 
and curious lore whose acquaintance he had never 
before made. 

His imaginary wings were soon enough to be 
clipped — his exhilaration to drop from him as sud- 
denly as it had come. 

He did not hear from Myra! 

He watched eagerly for the mails, and as day after 
day passed without bringing him a letter, deep dejec- 
tion claimed him. Finally he wrote to her again— and 
then again — and again — frantically appealing to her 
to write to him and assure him of her constancy if she 
would save his life. 

Still, no word from her. 

The truth was that Myra, at home in Eichmond, was 
awaiting each mail-time as feverishly as he. The faint 
suggestion of rose her cheeks usually wore, had entirely 
disappeared and deep circles caused by lack of sleep and 
lost appetite made her light blue eyes appear more 
prominent than ever before. The ethereal look that had 
been her chief claim to beauty had become exaggerated 
into a ghastliness that was not in the least bewitching. 
She, like Edgar, had pocketed her pride and followed 
her first letter with others more and more expressive 
of her tender maiden passion ; but her father, who had 
begun to suspect an affair between her and the players' 



112 THE DREAMER 

son a short time before Edgar left for the University, 
had kept diligent watch for the passage of letters, and 
had successfully intercepted them. 

And so the unhappy pair pined and sighed and 
gloomed, each reckoning the other faithless and believing 
that life was forever robbed of joy. 

Edgar Poe had never really loved the girl. He had 
merely loved the dream to which her tender words and 
timid caresses gave an adorable reality; but now in his 
disappointment at not hearing from her he felt that 
her love and loyalty to him were the only things in the 
world worth having and persuaded himself that without 
her there as no incentive to live or to strive. His 
misery was increased by an over-whelming home-sick- 
ness, to escape from which, he wandered restlessly about, 
vainly seeking excitement and forgetfulness. 

In this mood, he eagerly accepted an invitation to 
spend the evening from a class-mate whose room in 
" Rowdy Eow " had a reputation for conviviality. His 
own room, shared by a quiet and steady Richmond boy 
with whom he had a slight acqaintance at home, was 
in one of the cloister-like dormitories opening upon 
the main lawn. 

While Edgar Poe had been a somewhat wayward 
and at times a disobedient boy, at home, he had never 
been a had boy except when judged by John Allan's 
standards, and had never been in the least wild. Wines 
were used upon the table of his foster-father, as upon 
the tables of other gentlemen whose homes he had 
visited, and he had always been permitted to drink a 



THE DREAMER 113 

small quantit}^ at a time, at dinner, or to sip a little 
mint-julep from the goblet passed aroiind before 
breakfast and supposed to be conducive to appetite and 
healthful digestion; but he had never thought of ex- 
ceeding this allowance. As to cards, he knew nothing 
of them save as an innocent, social pastime in which 
he found pleasure, as in all other games and sports — 
especially such as required exercise of ingenuity or 
mental skill. 

The evening in " Eowdy Eow " was therefore a reve- 
lation, as well as a diversion to him. As he approached 
the end of this arcaded row in which his new friend's 
room was situated his interest received a spur from the 
sounds of hilarity that greeted him, and his spirits 
began to rise. In a few moments more he found him- 
self in the midst of a group of exceedingly jolly 
youths evidently prepared to make a night of it. 
Several of them were gathered about a huge bowl in 
which they were mixing a variety of punch which they 
called "peach-honey." Others were seated around a 
card table while one of their number entertained the 
rest with what seemed to be almost magical tricks. 
These Edgar joined. His interest was immediately 
aroused and he fixed his eyes with intentness upon 
the juggler. The tricks were new to him, but he soon 
amazed the crowd by showing the solution of them all. 

Finally, the punch was declared to be ready; other 
packs of cards were produced and the real sport of the 
evening began. It was Edgar's first experience in 
drinking with boys and his conscience, not yet hardened 



114 THE DREAMER 

to it, kept him in check without worrying him enough 
to destroy his pleasure. Somewhat of his old exilara- 
tion returned to him at the bare thought, for he felt 
himself a man, following his own will and yet not dis- 
obeying any direct command. 

In spite of much urging, he only drank one glass of 
the peach-honey, but thanks to a jovial ancestor of 
whom he had never heard, but of some of whose sins 
(in accordance with the ancient law) he bore the marks 
in his temperament, he was peculiarly susceptible to 
the influences of strong drink, and as he drained the 
glass at a gulp, a new freedom seemed to enter his 
soul. The dejection which had oppressed him drop- 
ped from him instantly, and with his great eyes glow- 
ing like lamps with new zest in life, he sat down at a 
card table to be initiated into the mysteries of the fas- 
cinating game of loo, which had lately become the 
fashion, and at the same time into his first experience 
in playing for money. 

He had beginner's luck — held good hands and won 
straight through the game. His success, with the ef- 
fects of the punch, developed his wittiest vein and 
Edgar Goodfellow assumed complete ascendancy. 

His new acquaintances were charmed, and en- 
couraged his mood by loud applause and congratulated 
themselves upon having added to their number such 
good company. 

From that night Edgar Poe's new friends, who con- 
stituted what was known as the ^^fast set" at the 
University, became his boon companions. It was in 



THE DREAMER 115 

the card-table, much more than the punch-bowl that 
the charm for him lay, for the gambling fever had 
entered his blood with his first winnings, but in the 
combination of the two he found, for the present, a 
sure cure for his " blue devils." 

Alas, Helen! Where was your sweet spirit that it 
did not hover, as guardian angel, about the head of 
this wayward child of genius in his hour of sore need, 
when temptations gathered thick around his pathway 
and there was no one to steer him into safer waters; 
no one to restrain his feet from their first blind steps 
toward that Disaster to which ruinous companion- 
ship invited him, with syren voice? 

True, his staid room-mate. Miles George, raised his 
voice in warning against the dangerous intimacies he 
was forming but Miles' view seemed extreme to him. 
Besides, he found at the University the same caste 
feeling that had cut him off from familiar intercourse 
with the leaders among his Eichmond schoolmates. 
It was but natural, therefore, that he should have 
turned gratefully, to the society where his welcome was 
sure. 

Finally words passed between him and Miles, ending 
in a formal meeting, with seconds on both sides. Their 
only weapons were their fists, and they shook hands 
afterward; but the idea of continuing to share the 
same bed-room was out of the question. Of the vacant 
rooms to be had, Edgar promptly decided upon N'um- 
ber 13, Rowdy Row, and the second step in a wrong 
direction quickly followed the first. 



116 THE DREAMER 

He was hailed by the rest of the " Eow " with de- 
light, and he promptly decided to return their many 
hospitalities in his new room, which he proceeded to 
elaborately prepare for their reception. 

The result was an early and noisy house-warming. 
The guests were filled with admiration to find the 
walls of Number 13 decorated in honor of the 
occasion with charcoal sketches representing scenes 
from Byron's works done by the clever hand of the 
new occupant himself. They also found Edgar Good- 
fellow in the character of host, presiding over his own 
card-table and his own bowl — a generous one — 
of peach-honey, in the highest feather and his most 
captivating mood. 



THE DREAMER 117 



CHAPTER XI. 



Erelong Number 13 was the liveliest and most popu- 
lar room in the Row, but of the orgies held there the 
faculty rested in blissful unconsciousness. At class- 
time young Poe was invariably in his place and invari- 
ably the pale, thoughtful, student-like and faultlessly 
neat and gentle-mannered youth whose intelligent at- 
tention and admirable recitations were the joy of his 
masters. They heard rumors that he was something 
of a poet and were not surprised, the suggestions of 
ideality in the formation of his brow and the expression 
of his eyes hinted at such talent, and so long as he did 
not let the Muse come between him and his regular 
work, he should not be discouraged or restrained. 

Indeed, in spite of the sway of Edgar Goodfellow 
at this time, Edgar the Dreamer was often present 
too, and during solitary tramps into the wild faste- 
nesses of the Ragged Mountains, he not only conceived 
many fancies to be worked into poems, but made 
mentally, the first draft of a story to win fame. 

The love of no real woman came to supplant the 
seemingly faithless Elmira, and though he still carried 
his mother's miniature with him and gazed often and 
fondly upon it, the sense of nearness between her spirit 
and his and the soul satisfaction he had found in this 
nearness in the past, were gone. The gambling fever 
that had fired his veins and the nightly potations of 



118 THE DREAMER 

peach-honey created an excitement and restlessness 
that blurred the images his memory held of the angel 
mother who had dominated his childhood and of the 
madonna-like mistress who had filled the dreams of 
his early youth. These holy dreams became for the 
time being, a reproach to him, for they aroused his 
conscience to an unpleasant activity which required 
more frequent recourse to peach-honey to quiet. 

Love was, nevertheless, as necessary to this poet's 
soul as meat and drink were to his body, and in the 
No Man's Land, " out of space, out of time," which 
his fancy created and where it loved to stray, he 
fashioned for himself the weirdest, strangest lady ever 
loved by mortal. The name he gave her was " Ligeia," 
She laid upon him no exactions, chastened him with 
no rebukes, demanded of him no service save that he 
should dream — and dream — and dream; for was not 
she herself formed from "such stuff as dreams are 
made of ? " 

The music of nature had long possessed a sort of 
personality for Edgar Poe, and now the voices, the 
motions, the numberless colors of the world about him 
took definite shape in his fancy of a wonderous i^arj- 
woman whom he worshipped with an unearthly, poetic 
passion that was compared to the passion of the normal 
man to flesh and blood woman as moonlight to sun- 
shine — a passion which was luminous without heat. 

Dim and elusive as is the very conception of 
" Ligeia " to the ordinary mind, she was perfectly real 



THE DREAMER 119 

to her creator. In the summer-night breeze he heard 
the music of her voice and felt the delicious coolness 
of her caress. Tall;, swaying trees spoke to him of her 
height, her majesty and her grace. He perceived the 
softness and lightness of her footfalls in the passage 
of evening shadows across a lake or meadow, the per- 
fection of her features in the form and finish of flower 
petals and the delicate tints of her beauty in the color- 
ing of flowers; the raven hue and sweeping length of 
of her tresses in the drowning shades of midnight and 
the entrancing veil of her lashes in deep mysterious 
woods; and when, in fancy, he looked beneath that 
veil into her eyes, as unfathomable as the ocean itself, 
he was struck dumb with reverence and wonder, for 
they held in keeping all the secrets of the moon and the 
stars, of dawn and sun-set, of green things growing 
and flowers in bloom, of the butterfly in the crysalis 
and on the wing, of still waters and of running brooks. 

To the inner vision of this most unusual youth, 
" Ligeia ^' — this myth called into being by the enchant- 
ment of his own fancy — not only became as real as if 
she had been flesh and blood; his pagan soul bowed 
down before her and she blotted from his mind, for 
the time, all thought or consciousness of more robust 
womanhood. She became, in imagination, the sharer 
of his studies, the wife of his bosom, and he sat at her 
feet and gladly learned from her the beautiful, strange 
secrets of this fearfully and wonderfully made world. 

He was sometimes haunted by another, and a far 
less agreeable vision. In spite of the absence of re- 



120 THE DREAMER 

straint under which he lived and the fact that between 
his dreams, his books and his dissipations there seemed 
'little opportunity left for the still, small voice to make 
itself heard, there were times when his better self 
shook off slumber and rose before him like a ghost 
that, for all his efforts, would not be laid — a ghost like 
him in all regards save for the sternness of its look 
and of the voice which accused him in whispers to 
which all others ears were deaf, but his own intensely, 
horribly sensitive. 

It was generally at the very height of excitement in 
play, when he had just been dealt a hand which he 
told himself, with exultation, would win him all the 
money in the pool, or, perhaps at the moment when he 
raised the glass to his lips, anticipating the delicious 
exhilaration of the seductive peach-honey, that the un- 
welcome spectre would, with startling suddenness, ap- 
pear before his eyes. His face would blanch, his own 
voice become almost as hoarse as the warning whisper 
that was in his ear, and with trembling hand he would 
put down the cards or the cup and refuse to have 
anything more to do with the evening's sport. 

His companions at first thought these attacks the 
result of some physical weakness but finally became 
accustomed to them and attributed them to his "queer- 
ness." 

Thus the youthful poet passed his year at college — 
dividing his time between his dreams, his classes and 
his carousals. The session closed in December. The 
final examinations occupied the early part of the month 



THE DREAMER 121 

and when the faculty met upon the 14th., it was 
found that Edgar Poe had not only stood well in all 
of his studies, but in two of them — Latin and French 
— he had taken the highest honors. 

In spite of this, and of the fact that at no time dur- 
ing the session had he come under the censure of the 
faculty, a startling revelation was made. Edgar Poe, 
model student as he seemed to be, whose only fault — 
if it could be called a fault — as the faculty knew him, 
had been a tendency toward a romantic dreaminess 
that had led him upon lonely rambles among the hills 
rather eccentric in a boy of seventeen; Edgar Poe, the 
quiet, the gentlemanly, the immaculately neat, the 
scholarly, the poetic, had been a spendthrift and a reck- 
less gambler. His debts, for a boy of his age, were 
astounding. No one was more amazed at the sum of 
them than Edgar himself. He had always had the 
lordly indifference to money, and the contempt for 
keeping account of it, that was the natural result of 
being used to have what seemed to him to be an un- 
limited supply to draw upon, with the earning of which 
he had nothing to do. As to hoarding it, he would as 
soon have thought of hoarding the air he breathed 
which came to him with no less effort. He was, un- 
fortunately, as heedless of what he ov/ed as what he 
spent — lavishing it upon his companions as long as it 
lasted and when his supply of cash was exhausted run- 
ning up accounts with little thought of a day of reckon- 
ing — though of course he fully intended to pay. 

His mind was, indeed, too much engrossed with the 



122 THE DREAMER 

charming creatioim of his brain to leave him time for 
brooding upon such sordid matters as the keeping of 
accounts, or the making of two ends meet. The 
amount of his indebtedness was now, however, suffi- 
cient to give him a shock which thoroughly aroused 
him, and he was genuinely distressed; for he had no 
wish to ruthlessly pain his foster-father. The haunt- 
ing better self not only arose and confronted him, but 
remained with him, keeping close step with him and 
upbraiding him and condemning him in the whisper 
audible to his quick imagination and so terrifying. 

Still, the thought that Mr. Allan had plenty of 
money, and that no severe sacrifice would be needful 
for the payment of his debts relieved his penitence of 
much of its poignancy. That Mr. Allan would 
settle these " debts of honor," as he called them, as the 
fathers and guardians of boys as reckless as himself 
had done, he had not the slightest doubt. But, as will 
be seen, he reckoned without Mr. Allan. 

He wrote Mrs. Allan a dutiful letter, confessing all 
and expressing his sorrow, and begging to be permitted 
to repay Mr. Allan for settling his affairs at the Uni- 
versity with work as a clerk in the counting house. 

The letter filled the tender heart of the foster-mother 
with yearning. The sum frightened her, though she, 
like the boy, comforted herself with the thought that 
her husband could pay it without embarrassment. 
Still, she trembled to think of his wrath. Her chief 
feeling was one of sympathy for her erring, penitent 
boy. How natural it was for one of his age to be led 



THE DREAMER 123 

away by evil associates! All boys — she supposed — 
must sow some wild oats, though few, she was confi- 
dent, showed such a beautifully penitent spirit, and it 
would be a small matter in future years when he should 
have become the great and good man she knew he was 
going to be. 

How noble it was of him. to offer to give up or post- 
pone the completion of the education so dear to his 
heart and tie himself to a desk in that tiresome count- 
ing-house in order to pay his debts — he that was bom 
to shine as a poet. She exulted that he had offered to 
make such a sacrifice, but he should never make it, 
never while slie had breath in her body to protest ! 

How her heart bled for him in his sorrow over his 
wrong -doing ! How she longed to fold his dear curly 
head against her breast and tell him that he was quite, 
quite forgiven! She would reward him for the splen- 
did stand in his classes and at the same time make 
him forget his troubles on account of the debts by giv- 
ing him the loveliest imaginable Christmas. Uncle 
Billy must search the woods for the brightest greens, 
the prettiest holly; for the house must look its mer- 
riest for the home-coming of its young master, covered 
with honors ! There must be mistletoe, too she told 
herself, her mouth dimpling and a suspicion of a 
twinkle flashing out from under her dewy lashes. The 
fatted calf should be killed, her boy should make merry 
with his friends. 

The dear letter was kissed and cried over until it 
took much smoothing on her knee to make it presentable 



124 THE DREAMER 

h-^ "'^"'' ■•■■ 

to hand over to her husband for perusal. Her fingers 
were still busy stroking out the crumples, though her 
tears were dried, and her thoughts were happily engaged 
with plans for a Christmas party worthy to celebrate 
the home-coming of her darling, when Mr. Allan came 
in to supper. She was brought back to recollection of 
the confession in the letter and her apprehensions as, 
to how it would be received, with a start, and before 
timidly, handing her husband the open letter, she began 
preparing him for its contents and excusing the writer. 

"A letter from Eddie, John, dear. He has stood 
splendidly in his classes, but asks your forgiveness for 
having done wrong in his spare time. He is so manly 
and noble in his confession, John, and in his offer to 
make reparation ! " 

John Allan's face clouded and hardened instantly. 

" What is this ? Confession ? Eeparation ? — Give 
me the letter ! " 

But she held it away from him. 

" It seems he has gotten into a card-playing set who 
have led him away further than he realized. Oh, don't 
look like that, John ! He is so young, and you know 
how evil association can influence the best of boys ! " 

But the storm gathered fast and faster on John 
Allan's face. 

'^ Card-playing ? Do you mean the boy has been 
gambling ? Give me the letter.'^ 

She could withhold it no longer, but as he sat down 
to read it she threw herself upon an ottoman at his feet 
and clasping his knees hid her face against them, crying. 



THE DREAMER 135 

" Oh, John, have pity, have pity ! " 

But even as she sobbed out the words, she felt their 
futility. She knew that there was no pity to be ex- 
pected from the owner of that face of stone, that eye of 
steel. 

As he read, his rage became too great for the relief of 
an outburst. A still, but icy calm settled upon him. 
For some minutes he spoke no word and seemed un- 
conscious of the tender creature so appealing in her 
loveliness and in the humility of her attitude, beseech- 
ing at his knee. The truth was, that much as he loved 
her, his contempt for what he called her " weakness '^ 
for the son of her adoption, but added to his harshness 
in judging the boy. 

Presently he arose, impatiently pushing her away 
from him as he did so, saying; 

" Pack my bag and order an early breakfast. I'm 
going to take the morning stage for the University." 

It was a difficult evening for the little foster-mother. 
In the stately, octagon-shaped dining-room soft lamp- 
light was cheerily reflected by gleaming mahogany and 
bright silver and china, upon which was served the most 
toothsome of suppers ; but the meal was almost untouched 
and the mere pretense of eating was carried through 
in silence and gloom. In the drawing-room, afterward, 
the firelight leaped saucily against shining andirons and 
fender, bringing forgetfulness of the frosty night out- 
side, while the carved wood-work and the great mirrors 
and soft-hued paintings, in their gilded frames, on the 
walls, and the deep carpets on the floors spoke of com- 
fort. But the beautiful room was a mockery, for the 



126 TEE DREAMER 

promised comfort, was not there — only futile luxury. 
Upon that bright hearth was warmth for the body, but 
none for the spirit, for before it sat the master and mis- 
tress — the presiding geniuses of the house — upon whose 
oneness the structure of the home must stand, or with- 
out it fall into ruin; there they sat, wrapped in moods 
so out of sympathy and tune that speech was as impos- 
sible between them as if they had been of different 
tongues, and each unknown to the other. 

Meantime, Edgar Poe was spending his last hours at 
the University in the dust and ashes of self-condemna- 
tion and regretful restrospection. No farewell orgie 
celebrated his leave-taking. Only one of his friends 
was invited to his room that night and he no denizen of 
" Eowdy Eow," but the quiet, irreproachable librarian. 
To this gentle guest The Dreamer confided his past sins 
and his penitence, while he laid upon the glowing coals 
the year's accumulation of exercise books, and the like, 
which had served their purpose and were finished and 
done with, and watched the devouring flames leap from 
the little funeral pyre they made into the chimney. 

More than anything he had ever done in his life, he 
told his companion, he regretted the making of the gam- 
bling debts for which Mr. Allan would have to advance 
the money to pay. But, as has been said, he reckoned 
without Mr. Allan, who settled all other obligations, but 
utterly ignored the so-called '^ debts of honor." 

" Debts of honor ? " he queried with contempt. 
" Debts of dishonor, I consider them.'^ 

And that was his last word upon the subject. 



TEE DREAMER 127 



CHAPTER XII. 



The late January night was bitterly cold, and clear as 
crystal. There was a metallic glitter about the round 
moon, shining down from a cloudless, blue sky — too 
bright to show a star — upon the black and bare trees 
and shrubbery in the terraced garden of the Allan 
homestead. 

Edgar Poe looked from his casement upon the splen- 
dor of the beautiful, but frigid and unsympathetic night. 
Bitterness was in his heart contending with a fierce joy. 
At last it had come — the breach with Mr. Allan — and 
he was going away! He knew not where, but he was 
going, going into the wide world to seek fame and for- 
tune. 

He had much to regret. He loved Richmond — loved 
it for the joy and pain he had felt in it; for the dreams 
he had dreamed in it. He loved it exceedingly for the 
two dear graves, one in the churchyard on the hill and 
one in the new cemetery, that held his beloved dead. 

Yes, he was sorry to leave this Tiome-citj, if not of his 
birth, at least of his childhood and early youth, and his 
soul was still shaken by the scene with his foster-parents 
through which he had just passed. But in spite of all, 
his heart — rejoicing in the nearness of the freedom for 
which he had so fiercely longed, sang, and stilled his 
sorrow. 

But a few weeks had passed since his return from the 
University. A few weeks ? They seemed to him years, 
and each one had left a feeling of increased age upon his 
spirit. 



128 THE DREAMER 

The home-coming had not been altogether unhappy — 
humiliating as it was. In spite of the black looks of his 
foster-father, the little mother (bless her!) had wel- 
comed him with out-stretched arms and eyes beaming 
with undimmed love. Never had she been more ten- 
derly sweet and dear. She had given the most beautiful 
Christmas party, with all his best friends invited, and 
everything just as she knew he would like it. Her hus- 
band had frowningly consented to this, but her tears 
and entreaties were all of no avail to win his consent 
for the boy's return to college. Vainly had she plead 
his talents which she believed should be cultivated, and 
the injustice (since they had voluntarily assumed the 
responsibility of rearing him) of cutting short his educa- 
tion at such an early age. John Allan was adamant. 

And so, after the holidays, he had taken his place in 
the counting-house of " Ellis and Allan." 

Distasteful as the new work was to the young poet, 
he was determined to stick to it, and would probably 
have done so, but the strict surveillance he soon realized 
he was under (as if he could not be trusted!) and the 
manner of Mr. Allan who rarely spoke to him except 
when it was absolutely necessary, and seemed to regard 
him as a hopeless criminal, would have been unbearable 
to a far less proud and sensitive nature than Edgar 
Poe's. Both at the office and at home, Mr. Allan's nar- 
row, steel-colored eyes seemed to keep constant watch, 
under their beetling brows, for faults or blunders ; and 
it seemed to the driven boy that no matter what he did 
or said, he should have done or said just the reverse. 
He felt constantly that a storm was brewing which 
must sooner or later, certainly break, and that night it 



TEE DREAMER 129 

had burst forth with all the fury of the tempest which 
has been a long time gathering. 

He hardly knew what had brought it on, or how it 
had begun. Its violence was so great as to almost stun 
him until at length, without being more than half con- 
scious of the significance of his own words he had asked 
if it would not be better for him to go away and earn 
his own living; and then came his foster-father's start- 
lingly ready consent, with the warning that if he did 
go he must look for no further aid from him. 

His heart ached for the pretty, tender little mother. 
How soft the arms that had clung about his neck, the 
lips that had pressed his hot brow ! How piteous her 
dear tears ! They had almost robbed him of his resolu- 
tion, but he had succeeded in steeling himself against 
this weakness. He had folded her close in his arms and 
kissed her, and vowed that, come what might, he could 
never forget her or cease to love her, and that he should 
always think of her as his mother and himself as her 
child. Then he had put her gently from him for, for 
all his vows, she was inseparably bound up in the old life 
from which he was breaking away — his life as John 
Allan's adopted son — she could have no real place in 
his future. 

Yet the tie that bound him to her was the strongest in 
his life and could not be severed without keen pain. In 
the world into which he was going to fight the battle of 
life (he told himself) memory of her would be one of 
his inspirations. 

But where was that battle to be fought, and with 
what weapons? He had been brought up as a rich 
man's son, and with the expectation of being a rich 
man's heir. He had been trained to no money-making 



130 TEE DREAMER 

work, physical or mental ; and now he was to fare forth 
into the great world where there was not a familiar face, 
even, to earn his bread ! What could he do that would 
bring him the price of a loaf ? — 

Did the question appal him? Not in the least. He 
had youth, he had health, he had hope, he had his be- 
loved talent and the secret training he had given him- 
self toward its cultivation. His "heart-strings were 
a lute '' — he felt it, and with an optimism rare for him 
he also felt that he had but to strike upon that lute and 
the world must needs stop and listen. 

What he did not have was experience and knowledge 
of the world. Little did he dream how small a part of 
the busy hive would turn aside to hear his music or how 
little poetry had to do with the earning of daily bread. 

His trunk was standing open, half packed, though 
his destination was still undecided; and among the first 
things that had gone into it was a box containing a 
number of small rolls of neat manuscript. As he 
thought of them his heart warmed and his eyes grew 
soft. 

" The world's mine oyster, and with my good pen I'll 
open it," he joyously paraphrased. But toward what 
part of the world should he turn his face — to what 
market take his precious wares? That was the all-im- 
portant question ! How much his fortune might depend 
upon his decision ! 

As he stood at the window, he stared into the bril- 
liancy and the shadows of the icy, unresponsive night — 
seeking a sign. But the cold splendor of the cloudless 
sky and glittering moon and the inscrutible shadows in 
the garden below where the leafless trees and bushes 



THE DREAMER 131 

cast monster shapes upon the frozen ground, alike 
mocked him. 

Presently there was the first hint of softness in the 
night. It came like a sigh of tender pity across the 
stillness and he bent his head to listen. It was the voice 
of the faintest of breezes blowing up from the south 
and passing his window. He threw wide his arms to 
empty space as if to embrace some invisible form. 

"Ligeia, Ligeia, my beautiful one/' he breathed, in- 
voking his dream-lady, "Be my counsellor and guide! 
Let thy sweet voice whisper whither I must go ! '' 

But the voice was silent and all the night was still 
again. 

He turned from the window and threw himself into 
his arm-chair, letting his eyes rove about the room as 
though he would seek a sign from its walls. Suddenly 
he sat erect, his dilated pupils fixed upon a point above 
the chimney-piece — upon a small picture. It was a 
little water-color sketch done by the hand of his versatile 
mother, and found among her belongings after her 
death. Like her miniature and her letters, the picture 
had followed him through his life and had always 
adorned the walls of his room. Often and over he had 
studied it until he knew by heart every stroke of the 
brush that entered into its composition. Yet he stared 
at it now as if he had never seen it before. Finally he 
took it down from its place on the chimney and held 
it in his hands, gazing upon it in deep abstraction. 

Underneath the picture was written its title : " Bos- 
ton Harbor — Morning," and upon its back, 

" For my little boy, Edgar, who must love Boston, 
the place of his birth, and where his mother found her 
best and most sympathetic friends.'* 



132 THEDBEAMER 

The picture gave him the sign! "With rising excite- 
ment he decided that it must be accepted. To Boston, 
of course, he would go. Boston, the place of his birth 
and where his angel mother had found her " best, most 
sympathetic friends." 

He would get away as early the next morning as pos- 
sible, he told himself. He would waste no time in good- 
byes, for, he remembered with some bitterness, there 
were few to say goodbye to. The boys were all off at 
college again, now that the holidays were over, and as 
for Myra, she had quickly consoled herself and was 
already a wife ! He had addressed some reproachful 
verses to her as a bride; then dismissed her from his 
thoughts. 

He arose and placed the picture carefully in the trunk 
with the rest of his treasures and then went to bed to 
fall into the easy slumber of one whose mind is well 
made up. 

A few days later Edgar Poe had looked with delight 
and ineffable emotion upon the real Boston Harbor, 
with its rocky little islets and its varied shipping and 
its busy wharves, and — for him — its suggestions of 
one in Heaven. 



THE DREAMER 133 



CHAPTEE XIII. 



Upon his arrival in Boston, our errant knight, before 
setting out upon his quest for the Fame and Fortune to 
whose service he was sworn, spent some hours in wan- 
dering about the old town, with mind open to the quick- 
ening influences of historic association and eye to the 
irregular, picturesque beauty about him. 

It was one of those rare days that come sometimes in 
the month of February when, though according to the 
callendar it should be cold, there is a warmth in the sun- 
shine that seems borrowed from Spring. Tired out by 
his tramp, young Edgar at length sat down upon a 
bench in the Common, under an elm, great of girth and 
wide-spreading. The sunshine fell pleasantly upon 
him, through the bare branches. Eoundabout were 
other splendid, but now bare elms and he sat gazing up- 
ward into their sturdy brown branches and dreamily pic- 
turing to himself the beauty of these goodly trees 
clothed in the green vesture of summer. Suddenly, by 
a whimsical sequence of suggestion, the pleasure he felt 
in the sunshine of February as it reached him under the 
tree in Boston Common, vividly called to mind the 
refreshing coolness of the shade of the elms, in full leaf, 
as he, a little lad of six, had walked the streets of old 
Stoke-Newington for the first time. 

There was little relation between that first and this 
present parting with the Allans, yet in his mind they 
became inseparably connected. He recalled his happi- 
ness in his first essays at composition, made at the Manor 
School, and told himself that, though he did not know 



134 THE DREAMER 

it at the time, that was the first step toward his life 
work. He was now, here in Boston, the city of his 
birth, about to take the second ; for the hour had arrived 
when his work would be given to the world ! 

Across his knees he held the box containing his 
precious manuscripts. He arose from the bench and 
turning toward the lower end of the Common, walked, 
with brisk, Iwpeful step down town, in the direction of 
a well-known publishing house whose location he had 
already ascertained. 

Edgar Poe had known sorrow, real and imaginary ; he 
was now to have his first meeting with Disappointment, 
bitter and grim. 

Of all the persons who had ever seen his work, every 
one had been warm in its praise — everyone saving 
John Allan only. Some had been positively glowing. 
True, they had not been publishers, yet among them 
there had been gentlemen and ladies of taste and cul- 
ture. But here was a different matter. Here was a 
personage with whom he had not reckoned, but who was 
the door, as it were, through which his work must pass 
into the world. He was unmistakably a personage. 
His bearing, though modest, spoke of power. His 
dress, though unobtrusive, was in the perfect taste which 
only the prosperous can achieve and maintain. His 
features were cast in the mold of the well-bred. He 
was past middle age and his naturally fine countenance 
was beautiful with the ennobling lines which time leaves 
upon the face of the seeker after truth. He was court- 
eous — most Bostonians and many publishers are. He 
was sympathetic. He was undoubtedly intellectual, but 
the eyes that regarded through big, gold-rimmed spec- 
tacles, the romantic beauty, the prominent brow and the 



TEE DREAMER 135 

distinguished air of the sweet-voiced youth before him, 
wore a not only thoughtful, but something more — a 
distinctly shrewd and practical expression. In them 
was no awe of the bare mention of "original poetry/^ 

He took the little rolls of manuscript into his strong, 
and at the same time smooth and well-shapen hands, 
and drew them out to their full length with the manner 
of one who handled as good every day. He cast his 
eyes rapidly down the sheets — too rapidly, it seemed 
to the poet — ^with a not unkind, yet critical air, while 
the sensitive youth before him turned red and white, 
hot and cold, by turns, and learned something of the 
horrors of the Inquisition. 

It was really but a very short space, but to the boy 
who seemed suspended between a life and a death sen- 
tence, it was an age. 

Finally, he experienced something like a drowning 
sensation while he heard a voice that barely penetrated 
the flood of deep waters that was rolling over his head, 
saying words that were intended to be kind about the 
work showing promise, in spite of an absence of market- 
able value. 

" Marketable value ? '' Heavens ! Was he back in 
John Allan's counting house? What could the man 
mean? It was as literature, not as merchandize that 
he wanted his poetry to be judged ! 

In his dismay, he stammered something of the sort, 
only to be told that when his poetry was made into a 
book it would become merchandize and it mattered not 
how good, as poetry — it might be, the publisher could 
do nothing with it unless as merchandize it would pro- 
bably be valuable too. 



136 THE DREAMER 

Then — he had been politely bowed out^, with his pack- 
age still under his arm ! 

During the few minutes he had spent in the pub- 
lisher's office the sky had become overcast and a biting 
east wind had blown up from the river; but the change 
in the outside world was as nothing to that within him. 
He had not known how large a part of himself was 
his dream of becoming a poet. It now seemed to him 
that it was all of him — had from the beginning of his 
life been all of him. Since those old days at Stoke- 
Newington, he had been building — building — building 
— this castle in the air ; now, at one fell blow, the whole 
fabric was laid in ruin ! 

Weakness seized his limbs and deep dejection his 
spirits. His life might as well come to an end for 
there was nothing left for him to live for. How in- 
deed, was he to live when the only work he knew 
how to do had " no marketable value ? " The money 
with which Mrs. Allan supplied him before he left 
home — " to give him a start " — would soon be ex- 
hausted. What if he should not be able to make more? 

Though he was in the city of his birth, he found him- 
self an absolute stranger. If any of those who had been 
S3anpathetic friends to his mother were left, he had no 
idea who or where they were. 

He went back to the lodgings he had engaged to a 
night of bitter, sleepless tossing. 

But with the new day, youth and hope asserted them- 
selves. He decided that he would not accept as final 
the verdict of any one publisher, though that one stood 
at the head of the list. With others, however, it was 
just the same; and another night of even greater 
wretchedness followed. 



TEE DREAMER 137 

Upon his third day in Boston (he felt that he had 
been there a year ! ) he wandered aimlessly about, spirit 
broken, ambition gone. Finally, in "Washington Street, 
he discovered, upon a small door, a modest sign bearing 
the legend: 

" Calvin F. S. Thomas. Printer." 

With freshly springing hope, he entered the little 
shop and was received by a pale, soft-eyed, snnken- 
chested and somewhat threadbare youth of about 
his own age, who in reply to his inquiry, announced 
himself as "Mr. Thomas." 

Between these two boys, as they stood looking frank- 
ly into each other^s eyes, that mysterious thing which 
we call sympathy, which like the wind "bloweth where 
it listeth and no man knoweth whence it cometh or 
whither it goeth," sprang instantly into being. The 
one found himself without his usual diffidence declar- 
ing himself a poet in search of a publisher, and the 
other was at once alert with interest. 

Calvin Thomas had but just — timorously, for he 
was poor as well as young — set up his little shop, 
hoping to build up a trade as a printer. To be a pub- 
lisher had not entered into his wildest imaginings^ — 
much less a publisher for a poet ! But he was, like his 
visitor, a dreamer, and like him ambitious. Why should 
he not be a publisher as well as a printer? The poet 
had not his manuscripts with him, but offered to recite 
some extracts, which he did, with glowing voice and 
gesture — explaining figures of speech and allusions as 
he went along. 

Edgar Poe sat easily upon a high stool in the little 
shop. His dress was handsome and, as always, exquisite 
in its neatness and taste. His whole appearance and 



138 THE DREAMER 

bearing were marked by an ^' air " which deeply im- 
pressed the yonng printer who had promptly fallen 
under the spell of his personal charm. He had laid 
his hat upon the desk, baring the glossy brown ringlets 
that clustered about his large, pale brow. His clear- 
cut features were mobile and eager; his dark grey eyes 
full of life. His voice had a wonderful musical quality, 
becoming passionate when, as at present, his feeling 
was deeply aroused. 

His poetry, recited thus, gained much of distinction. 
Its crudities would have been lost, to a great extent, 
even upon a critic. But Thomas was no critic. He was 
simply a dreamy, half-educated youth with a mind 
open to the beautiful and the romantic. The flights 
of the poet's fancy did not seem to him obscure or too 
fantastic. They admitted him to a magic world in 
which he sat spell-bound until silence brought him 
back to his tiny bare shop which seemed suddenly to 
have been glorified. 

"It is wonderful — wonderful! " he breathed. 

He began to picture himself as not only sharing the 
wealth, but the fame which the publication of these 
gems was bound to bring. But he had to explain that 
he was poor, and that he could not bring out the poems 
without financial aid. The money which had been 
given Edgar to set out in the world with, was already 
dwindling, but he managed to subscribe a sum which 
Thomas declared would be sufficient, with the little he 
himself could add, for the printing of a modest edition, 
in a very modest garb. 



THE DREAMER 139 



CHAPTER XIV. 



In the Allan mansion, in Richmond, there was a 
stillness that was oppressive. No young foot-falls 
sounded upon the stair; no boyish laughter rang out 
in rooms or hall. There were handsome and formal 
dinners occasionally, when some elderly, distinguished 
stranger was entertained, but there were no more merry 
dancing parties, with old Cy playing the fiddle and call- 
ing the figures. 

Frances Allan, fair and graceful still, though look- 
ing somewhat out of health and "broken," as her 
friends remarked to one another, trod softly about the 
stately rooms with no song on her lip, no gladness in 
her step. Her husband was grown suddenly prematurely 
old and his speech was less frequent and harsher than 
before. He was more immersed in business than ever 
and was prospering mightily, but the fact seemed to 
bring him no satisfaction. Even the old servants had 
lost much of their mirth. Their black faces were 
grown solemn and their tread heavy. They looked with 
awe upon their mistress when, as frequently happened, 
they saw her quietly enter " Marse Eddie's " room and 
close the door behind her. 

In that room and there alone, the fair, gentle, woful 
creature gave free reign to the grief of her stricken 
mother-heart. The room was kept just as her boy had 
left it, for she constantly hoped against hope that he 
would return. Hers was the aching, pent-up grief of 
a mother whose child is dead, yet she is denied the 
solace of mourning. 



140 TEE DREAMER 

Here was the bed which had pillowed his dear, 
sunny ringlets. Here were his favorite chair^ — ^his desk 
— his books. In a little trunk against the wall were 
his toys with some of the pretty clothes made with her 
own fingers, in which it had been her pride to dress 
him when he was a wee laddie. How she loved to finger 
and fondle them ! 

Fifteen years she had been his mother — now this was 
all she had ! Somewhere in the same world with her 
he was living, was walking about, talking, eating, sleep- 
ing; yet he was dead to her! Oh, if she could only 
know that he was happy, that he was well, that he 
lacked nothing in the way of creature comfort; if she 
could know where he was, picture him at work or in 
his leisure hours, it would not be so hard to bear. 

But she knew nothing — nothing — save that he had 
gone to Boston. 

One letter she had had from him there — such a dear 
one ! — she knew it by heart. In it he had called her 
" Mother " and assured her of his constant love and 
thought of her. He had arrived safely, he said, and 
would soon be busy making his living. Boston was a 
fine city and full of interest to him. When his ship 
came in he was going to have her come on and pay him 
a visit there. He would write again when he had any- 
thing worth telling. 

Days had passed — weeks — and no word had come. 
Had he failed to obtain employment? Had he gone 
further — to New York, perhaps, or Philadelphia? She 
did not know. Oh, if she could but know! 

Was he ill? Fear clutched her heart and made her 
faint. The suspense was terrible, and she had no one 
to go to for sympathy — no one. She dared not men- 



THE DREAMER 141 

tion her anxiety to her husband; it made him furious. 
He could not stand the sound of Eddie's name, even— 
her darling, beautiful Eddie ! Her arms felt so empty 
they ached. 

Winter was passing. The garden that Eddie loved 
so dearly was coming to life. The crocuses for which 
he always watched with so much interest were come and 
gone. The jonquils were in bloom and the first sweet 
hyacinths, blue as turquoises, she had gathered and put 
in his room. It cheered her to see them there. Some- 
how, they made the room look more "ready" than 
usual — as if he might come home that day. 

He did not come, but something else did. A letter 
with the Boston post-mark she had so longed to see, 
and a small, flat package addressed to her in his dear 
hand. She broke the seal of the letter first— she was 
so hungry for the sight of the familiar, " Mother dear," 
and to know how he fared. 

It was a short letter, but, ah, the blessed relief of 
knowing he was well and happy! And prospering— 
prospering famously— for he told her he was sending 
her the first copy off the press of his book of poems ! 
It was a very little book, he said, but it was a beginning. 
He felt within him that he would have much bigger 
and better things to show her erelong. For the present, 
he was hard at work making ready for a revised and 
enlarged edition of his book, if one should be called 
for. 

There was a jubilant note in the letter that delighted 
her and communicated itself to her own spirits. She 
eagerly tore the wrappings from the package, and 
pressed the contents against her lips and her heart. 
It was but a slender volume, cheaply printed and 



142 TEE DREAMER 

bound, but it was her boy's first published work and a 
wonderful thing in her eyes. She already saw him 
rich and famous — saw him come home to her crowned 
with honor and success — vindicated. 

She turned the pages of the book. He had written 
upon the fly-leaf some precious words of presentation 
to her. She kissed them rapturously and passed on to 
the title-page: 

" Tamerlane and Other Poems. By a Bostonian. Bos- 
ton: Calvin F. S. Thomas, Printer." 

She was still gloating over her treasure when the 
brass knocker on the front door was sounded, and a 
minute later Myra Royster — now Mrs. Shelton — was 
announced. Taking the book with her, she tripped 
downstairs, singing as she went, and burst in upon 
Myra as she sat in state in the drawing-room, in all 
her bridal finery. 

Myra noticed as she kissed her, her glowing cheeks 
and shining eyes. 

" How well you are looking today, Mrs. Allan," she 
exclaimed. 

" It is happiness, dear. I've just had such a delight- 
ful letter from Eddie, and this darling little book. It 
is his poems, Myra ! " 

Myra was all interest. " To think of knowing a real 
live author ! she exclaimed. " I was sure Eddie would 
be famous some day, but had no idea it would come so 
soon." 

" Don't you wish you had waited for him ? " teased 
Mrs. Allan, laughing happily. 

They chatted over the wonderful news until nearly 
dinner-time, and after they had parted Mrs. Allan sat 
at the window watching for her husband to come home 



THE DREAMER 143 

that she might impart it to him at the earliest moment 
possible. But when at last he appeared she put off 
the great moment until after dinner, and then when 
he was comfortably smoking a fragrant cigar she ap- 
proached him timidly and placed the letter and the 
book in his lap without a word. 

"What's all this? " he questioned eharply. 
She made no reply, but hovered about his chair, 
too excited to trust herself to speak. 

He picked up the letter and read it with a deepening 
frown, then opened the book and ran his eyes hurriedly 
down one or two of its pages. At length he spoke : 

" So this is the way he's wasting his time and, I 
dare say, his money too. Will the boy ever amount 
to anything, I wonder?" 

The happiness in Frances Allan's face gave place to 
quick distress. 

" Oh, John," she cried, " Don't you think it amounts 
to anything for a boy of eighteen to have written and 
published a book of poetry ? " 

" Poetry ? This stuff is bosh— utter bosh ! " 
For the first time in her life, there was defiance 
in her gentle face. Her clinging air was discarded. 
She raised her head and with flashing eyes and rising 
color, faced him. 

" You think that, because you cannot understand or 
appreciate it," she retorted, with spirit. " Neither do 
I understand it, but I can see that it is wonderful 
poetry. If he can do this at eighteen I have no doubt 
he will make himself and us famous before many years 
are past ! " 

Her husband's only reply was an astonished and 
piercing stare which she met without flinching, then 



144 THE DREAMER 

turned and swept from the room^ leaving him with a 
feeling of surprise to see that she was so tall. 

Hier self assertion was but momentary. As she 
ascended the stair and entered Eddie's room, all the 
elasticity was gone from her step, all the brightness 
from her cheeks and eyes and, still clasping her boy's 
letter and book to her heart, she threw herself upon 
his bed and burst into a passion of tears. 

Meantime, the elms on Boston Common were clothed 
with tender April green and under foot sweet, soft 
grass was springing. In this inspiring cathedral 
walked Edgar Poe, his pale face and deep eyes, passion- 
ate with the worship of beauty that filled his soul, lifted 
to the greening arches above him, his sensitive ears 
entranced with the bird-music that fluted through the 
cool aisles. His mind was teeming with new poems in 
the making and with visions of what he should do if his 
book should sell. 

But it did not sell. The leading magazines acknowl- 
edged its receipt in their review columns, but with the 
merest mention, which was exceedingly disconcerting. 
It was discussed (but with disappointment) for a week 
by his friends at home and at the University, to whom 
he sent copies. Then was forgotten. 

And now its author was, for the first time within 
his recollection, beginning to feel the pinch of pov- 
erty. His money was almost gone and he saw no imme- 
diate hope of getting more. He moved to the cheapest 
boarding house he could find but he did not mind that 
so much as the prospect that faced him of soon begin- 
ning to present a shabby appearance in public. His 
shoes were already shewing wear, and he found that to 



THE DREAMER 145 

keep his linen as immaculate as he had always been 
accustomed to have it cost money and he actually had 
to economize in the quantity of clothing he had laund- 
ered. This to his proud and fastidious nature was 
humiliating in the extreme. 

He and Calvin Thomas held frequent colloquies as 
to ways and means of giving his book wider circulation. 
He visited the offices of the several newspapers of the 
town in the hope of getting work in the line of journal- 
ism — reporting^ reviewing, story-writing, anything in 
the way of the only business or profession for which 
he felt that he had any aptitude or preparation; but 
without success. 

At length the sign of "Calvin F. S. Thomas, 
Printer " had suddenly disappeared from the little shop 
in Washington Street, and a dismal " To Let," was in 
its place. 

At about the same time Mrs. Blanks lost the hand- 
some, quiet young gentleman, who had evidently seen 
better days, from her unpretentious lodging house, and 
the walks under the elms in Boston Common were no 
longer trodden by The Dreamer from Virginia. 



146 TEE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XV. 

Where was Edgar Poe? — 

Twice since he shook the dust of Richmond joyfully 
from his feet, fair Springtide had visited the terraced 
garden of the Allan home. Twice the green had come 
forth, first like a misty veil, then like a mantle envelop- 
ing its trees and its shrubs, its arbors and trellises; 
twice the procession of flowers, led by the crocuses in 
their petticoats of purple and yellow, had tripped from 
underground; twice the homing birds had built in the 
myrtles and among the snowy pear and cherry blos- 
soms and filled all the place with music. Twice, too, 
in this garden, the pageant of spring and summer and 
sunset-hued autumn had passed, the birds had flown 
away again and winter snows had covered all with their 
whiteness and their silence. 

And still the garden's true-lover, the poet. The 
Dreamer, was a wanderer, where? — 

Oh, beautiful " Ligeia/' was it not your voice that now 
and again whispered in the tree-tops and among the 
flowers? Could you not — did you not, bring news of 
the wanderer? 

If she did, there was no human being to whom her 
language was intelligible, and the trees and the flowers 
keep their secrets well. 

Within the homestead there was little change save 
a deepening of the quietness that had fallen upon it. 
In the master of the house there was no visible dif- 
ference. There are some men who seen from year to 
year seem as unchanging as the sphinx. It is only 



TEE DREAMER 147 

after a long period that any difference in them can be 
detected and then they suddenly appear broken and 
aged. The fair lady of the manor was as fair as ever, 
but with the pale, tremiulous fairness of a late star in 
the grey dawn of a new day in which it will have no 
part. Her bloom, her roundness, her gaiety — all these 
were gone. She spent more time than ever in the room 
which, waiting for its roving tenant, became more and 
more like a death chamber. The silence there was not 
now broken by her sobs even, for it was with dry-eyed 
grief that she watched and waited for her boy, these 
days — watched and waited and prayed. Ah, how she 
prayed for him, body and soul ! Prayed that wherever 
he might be, he might be kept from harm and strength- 
ened to resist temptation. 

Was it her agonized petitions that kept him to the 
straight and narrow path of duty during those two 
years amid uncongenial surroundings and hard condi- 
tions ? 

Who knows? 

Yet the chair and the desk and the books and the 
vases of fresh flowers on the mantel, and the fire-wood 
resting on the shining andirons ready for a match, and 
the reading lamp with trimmed wick and bright chim- 
ney on the table, and the canopied white bed still 
waited, in vain, his coming. 

Many months had passed since the name of Eddie 
had been spoken between husband and wife, but though 
she held her peace, like Mary of old, like Mary too, 
she pondered many things in her heart. He, loving 
her well, but having no aptitude for divining woman's 
ways, indulged in secret satisfaction, for he took her 
silence to mean that she was coming to her senses, 



148 THE DREAMER 

and regarding the boy as he did. That she no longer 
importuned him to enquire into Edgar's whereabouts 
with the intention of inviting him home was a source 
of especial relief to him. 

Then, upon a day two years after she had triumphant- 
ly placed Eddie's book and letter in his hands, it was 
his turn to bring her a letter. 

"You see the bad penny has turned up again/' he 
remarked, dryly. 

She looked questioningly at the folded sheet. Its 
post-mark was Fortress Monroe and the hand-writing 
was not familiar to her. 

"What is it?" she asked. 

" A letter from Dr. Archer. He's surgeon at the 
fort, you know. Eead it. It is about Edgar." 

With shaking hands and a blanched face she spread 
open the sheet. A nameless dread possessed her. A 
letter about Eddie — not from him — and from a sur- 
geon ! For a moment darkness seemed to descend upon 
her and she could not make out the characters before 
her. She pressed her hand upon her heart. In sudden 
alarm, her husband rushed to a celaret nearby and 
brought out a decanter of wine. Pouring a glass he 
pressed it to her lips. 

" Eddie," she gasped, as soon as she could speak. 
"Is he well?" 

In spite of John Allan's anxiety, he was irritated, 
and showed it. 

" Pshaw, Frances ! " he exclaimed. I hoped you had 
forgotten the boy. Yes, he's well, and, I'm glad to say, 
in a place where he is made to behave." 

She calmed herself with an effort and began to read 
the letter. The story it told had a smack of romance. 



TEE DREAMER 149 

Dr. Archer had (he wrote) been called to the hos- 
pital in the fort to see a private soldier by the name 
of Edgar A. Perr}^ who was down with fever. The 
patient spoke but little but the Doctor was struck with 
his marked refinement of look and manner, and there 
was something familiar to him about the prominent 
brow and full grey eyes, though the name was strange 
to him. His attention was aroused and he could not 
rid himself of the impression that he had seen the 
young man before. He mentioned the fact to some of 
the officers and found at once that his patient was a 
subject of deep interest to them. They felt sure (they 
told him) that he had a story. His polished manners 
and bright and cultivated conversation seemed to them 
incongruous with the duties of a private soldier, and 
they laughingly said that they suspected they were 
entertaining an angel unawares. Yet his duties were 
performed with the utmost faithfulness and efficiency. 
He had never been heard to speak of himself or his 
past in a way which would throw any light upon his 
history, and his reserve was of the kind which was bound 
to be respected. Dr. Archer had grown (he wrote) 
more and more interested in his patient as he became 
better acquainted with him, and being convinced that 
the young man had for some reason, gotten out of his 
proper sphere, he determined to try and help him back 
to it. 

By the time the young soldier was convalescent the 
Doctor had won his confidence and obtained from him 
the confession that the name of Perry was an assumed 
one, and that he was none other than Mr. Allan's 
adopted son, Edgar Poe, whom Dr. Archer had not 
seen since he was a small boy. 



150 TEE DREAMER 

The discovery of his identity had greatly increased 
the good Doctor's interest and he and the officers of 
the fort were of the opinion that as young Poe had 
made a model soldier (having been promoted to the 
rank of sergeant-major, for good conduct) the best 
thing that could be done for him was to secure his dis- 
charge and get him an appointment to West Point. 
This, Mr. Allan could bring about, he thought, through 
men of influence whose friendship the Doctor knew he 
enjoyed. Edgar had enlisted for five years. He had 
confessed that at the time he had been almost upon the 
point of starvation and had turned to the army when 
every effort to find other means of livelihood had 
failed. 

The Doctor and other officers thought that it would 
be a great sacrifice to leave a young gentleman of 
Edgar's abilities to three more years of such uncon- 
genial life. 

He was quite recovered and in accordance with a 
promise made the Doctor, was writing to Mr. Allan 
at that moment. 

"Did Eddie's letter come too?" Mrs. Allan asked, 
as she finished the one in her hand. 

Without a word, her husband handed it over to her. 
In it Edgar expressed much contrition for the trouble 
which his larger experience in life told him he had cost 
his foster-father, and asked his forgiveness. He also 
asked that Mr. Allan would follow the suggestion of 
Dr. Archer, and apply for a discharge from the army 
for him, and an appointment to West Point. 

He had not written his " Mother " in the past be- 
cause he had unfortunately nothing to tell which he 



THE DREAMER 151 

believed could give her any pleasure, but he sent her 
his undying love. 

Frances Allan looked through wet lashes into her 
husband's face, but her eyes were shining through the 
tears. 

" Oh, John/' she said breathlessly ," You will have 
him to come and make us a little visit before he goes 
to West Point, won't you ? " 

" I'll have nothing to do with him ! " was the em- 
phatic reply. " He seems to be getting along very well 
where he is. Let him stick it out ! " 

Feeling how vain her pleadings would be, yet not 
willing to give up hope, she wept, she prayed, she hung 
upon John Allan's neck. She brought every argument 
that starved motherhood could conceive to bear upon 
him. 

To think that Eddie was in Virginia — just down 
at Old Point ! The cup of joy was too near her lips to 
let it pass without a mighty effort. But finally she gave 
up and shrank within herself, drooping like the palest 
of lilies. 

Then came a day when a stillness such as it had 
never known before hung over the Allan home. The 
garden was at its fairest. The halls and the drawing- 
rooms, with their rich furnishings and works of art 
were as beautiful as ever; but there was not even a 
bereaved mother, with an expression on her face like 
that of Mary at the foot of the cross, to tread the 
lonely floors. The luxurious rooms were quite, quite 
empty — all save one — an upper chamber, where upon 
a stately carved and canopied bed lay all that was 
mortal of Frances Allan, like a lily indeed, when piti- 
less storm has laid it low ! 



152 TEE DREAMER 

The learned doctors who had attended her had given 
long Latin names to her malady. In their books there 
was mention of no such ailment as heartbreak, and 
so happily, the desolate man left to preside in lonely 
state, over the goodly roof-tree which her presence had 
filled and made sweet and satisfying, was spared a sus- 
picion even, of the real cause of her untimely end. 

His one consuming desire for the present was that 
all things should be done just as she would wish, and 
so — all minor bitternesses drowned in the one over- 
whelming bitterness of his loss — he scribbled a few hur- 
ried lines to Edgar Poe acquainting him with the sad 
news and telling him to apply for a leave and come 
" home '^ at once. 

But the mails and travel were slow in those days, and 
when the young soldier reached Eichmond the last, sad 
rites were over, and for the third time in his brief 
career the grave had closed over a beautiful woman who 
had loved him and upon whose personality had been 
based in part, that ideal of woman as goddess or angel 
before which his spirit throughout his life, with all its 
vicissitudes, bowed down. As the lumbering old stage 
crawled along the road toward Richmond, he lived 
over again the years spent in the sunshine of her 
presence. Her death was a profound shock to him. 
How strange that one so fair, so merry, so bubbling 
with life should cease to be! Would it always be his 
fate, he wondered, to love where untimely death was 
lying in wait? 

Upon the night when he reached " home " and every 
night till, his furlough over, he returned to his post 
of duty at Fortress Monroe, he lay in his old room 
with his old household gods — his books in their shelves. 



THE DREAMER 153 

his pictures on the walls^ his desk and deep arm-chair, 
and other objects made dear by daily use in their accus- 
tomed places, and " the lamplight gloating o'er/' around 
him. He was touched at the sweet, familiar look of it 
all and at the thoughtfulness of himself of which he 
saw signs everywhere. Could it be that he had been 
two years an exile from these homelike comforts or 
had it been only one of his dreams? In spite of the 
void her absence made, it was good to be back — 
good after his wanderings to come into his own again. 

In the hush and loneliness of those few days under 
the same roof, the grief-stricken man and youth, their 
pride broken by their common sorrow, came nearer to- 
gether than they ever had been before. It seemed that 
the gentle spirit of her whom each had loved hovered 
about them, binding them to each other by invisible, but 
sacred, cords. John Allan spoke to the players' son in 
tones that were almost fatherly and with quick re- 
sponse, the tender-hearted youth became again the 
Edgar of the days before reminders of his dependence 
upon charity had opened his eyes to the difference 
between a real and an adopted father. 

Under this reconciling influence, the youth poured 
out expressions of penitence for the past and made 
resolutions for the future and Mr. Allan promised to 
apply for the desired appointment to West Point, but 
added that thereafter, he should consider himself re- 
lieved of all responsibility concerning Edgar. 

This blunt and ungracious assurance strained the 
bond between the adopted father and son ; the promised 
letter of application to the Secretary of War, ruthlessly 
shattered it. That his indulgencies during his year at 
the University of Virginia, so freely and earnestly 



164 THE DREAMER 

repented, should have been exposed in the letter seemed 
to the boy unnecessary and cruel, but the man who 
had been fifteen years his father, the husband of her 
over whom the grave had but just closed and who 
had always loved him — Edgar — as an own and only 
son, had seen fit to add to the declaration, 

" He left me in consequence of some gambling debts 
at the University," a disclaimer of even a sentimental 
interest in him ! 

^^ Frankly, Sir," the letter said, " I do declare that 
Edgar Poe is no relation to me whatever; that I have 
many in whom I have taken an active interest in order 
to promote theirs, with no other feeling than that every 
man is my care, if he be in distress." 

Edgar Poe duly presented the letter, but the bitter- 
ness which during his brief visit home had been put to 
sleep, raised its head and robbed him of all pleasure in 
his anticipated change and of much of the incentive 
to put forth his best effort in it. He felt that the 
result of this ungracious letter must be to blot the 
new leaf which he had so ardently desired to turn with 
shadows of his past which no effort of his own could 
entirely obliterate. 

For the soreness of finding himself disowned as Mr. 
Allan's son — this time publicly, in a manner — he 
found somewhat of balm in the letter of cordial praise 
addressed to the Honorable Secretary of War in his 
behalf, by the father of his old friend, Jack Preston. 
Mr. Preston described him as a young gentleman of 
genius who had already gained reputation for talents 
and attainments at the University of Virginia, and 
added, 

" I would not write this recommendation if I did not 



THE DREAMER 155 

believe he would remunerate the Government at some 
future day by his services and talents, for whatever may 
be done for him." 

Happily for the, at times, morbidly, sensitive youth, 
he had soon forgotten the sting caused by the letter 
in a return to the dreams which he regarded as not 
only the chief joy but the chief business of his life; 
for though he was preparing himself for the profession 
of a soldier, he had never for a moment, forsworn the 
Muse of Poetry. For a whole year before being trans- 
ferred to Fortress Monroe he had been stationed at 
Fort Moultrie, in Charleston harbor. There his won- 
derful dream-lady, "Ligeia," had seemed especially 
near to him, and often, when the day's work was done 
and he recognized her voice in the music of the waves 
or felt her kiss in the soft, southern air, blown across 
spicey islets, he would up and away with her across 
the world, on the moon's silver track; or on nights 
when no moon came up out of the sea, would wander 
with her through the star-sown sky. 

There was one fair star that invited his fancy with 
peculiar insistence. It seemed to beckon to him with 
the flashes of its beams. He questioned " Ligeia " of it 
and she told him that it was none other than Al Aaraaf, 
the great star discovered by Tycho Brahe, which after 
suddenly appearing and shining for a few nights with 
a brilliancy surpassing that of Jupiter, disappeared 
never to be seen again; never except by him — The 
Dreamer — to whom it was given not only to gaze upon 
it from the far earth, but, with her as his guide, to 
visit it and to explore its fairy landscape where the 
spirits of lost sculptures enjoyed immortality. 



156 THE DREAMER 

The result of this flight of fancy to a magical world 
was the poem, " Al Aaraaf ." 

He spent the interim between his honorable dis- 
charge from the army and his entrance at "West Point 
in a happy visit to Baltimore, where he made the 
acquaintance of his father's kindred and succeeded in 
publishing the new poem, with a revised edition of the 
old ones. 

For the first time, his work appeared under his own 
signature : 

" Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and Minor Poems. By Edgar 
A. Poe." 

The new poem was unintelligible to the critics — but 
what of that? he asked himself One of his optimistic 
moods was upon him. He despised the critics for their 
lack of perception and as he held the slim volume in 
his hands and gazed upon that, to him, wondrous title- 
page, his countenance shone as though it had caught 
the reflection of the magic star itself. What mattered 
all the wounds, all the woes of his past life? He had 
entered into a land where dreams came true ! 

For the first time, too, his work received recognition 
as poetry, in the literary world. It was but a nod, yet 
it was a beginning; and it pleased him to think that 
this first nod of greeting as a poet came to him from 
Boston, where his mother had found "her best, most 
sympathetic friends." Before publishing his new book 
he had sent some extracts from it to Mr. John ISTeal, 
Editor of the Yanlcee and Boston Literary Gazette, who 
promptly gave them a place in his paper, with some 
kind words commending them to lovers of "genuine 
poetry." 

" He is entirely a stranger to me," wrote the Boston 



THE DREAMER 157 

editor, of the twenty-year-old poet, " but with all his 
faults, if the remainder of Al Aaraaf and Tamerlane 
are as good as the body of the extracts here given, he 
will deserve to stand high — very high — in the estima- 
tion of the shining brotherhood/' 

In a burst of gratitude the happy poet wrote to Mr. 
Neal his thanks for these " very first words of encour- 
agement," he had received. 

" I am young," he confided to this earliest friend in 
the charmed world of letters, "I am young — not yet 
twenty — am a poet if deep worship of all beauty can 
make me one^ — and wish to be so in the common mean- 
ing of the word." 



158 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XVI. 



Upon a dark and drizzling November night of the 
year 1830, four cadets of West Point Academy sat 
around a cosy open fire in Room 28, South Barracks, 
spinning yarns for each other's amusement. 

One of them — the one with the always handsome 
and scholarly, at times soft and romantic, but tonight, 
dare-devil face, was easily recognizable as Edgar the 
Goodfellow, frequently appearing in the quite opposite 
character of Edgar the Dreamer, and cormnonly known 
as Edgar Poe. His fellow cadets had dubbed him, 
"the Bard.'' Two of this young man's companions 
were his room-mates in Number 28, " Old P," and 
" Gibs," and the third was a visitor from North Bar- 
racks. 

Taps had sounded sometime since, and the Barracks 
were supposed to be wrapt in slumber, but for these 
young men the evening had just begun. Several hours 
had elapsed since supper and it is a well-known fact 
that there is never a time or a season when a college 
boy is not ready to eat. Someone suggested that polite- 
ness demanded they should entertain their guest with 
a fowl and a bottle of brandy from Benny Haven's shop, 
and proposed that they should draw straws to deter- 
mine which of the three hosts should fetch the necessary 
supplies. They had no money, but the accommodating 
" Bard " agreed to sacrifice his blanket in the cause of 
hospitality; and armed with that and several pounds 
of tallow candles, " Gibs," upon whom , the lot had 
fallen, set forth to run the blockade to Benny's. This 



TEE DREAMER 159 

was a risky business, for the vigilance of Lieutenant 
Joseph Locke, one of the instructors in tactics who was 
also a sort of supervisor of the morals and conduct of 
cadets, was hard to elude. As one of the Bard^s own 
effusions ran, 

"John Locke was a very great name; 
Joe Locke was a greater, in short, 
The former was well known to Fame, 
The latter well known to Report." 

The best that Benny would give, in addition to the 
bottle, for the blanket and candles, was an old gander, 
whose stentorian and tell-tale voice he obligingly hushed 
by chopping off its head. Under cover of the darkness and 
the storm, " Gibs '' succeeded in safely returning to the 
Barracks but not until his hands and his shirt were 
reeking with the gander^s gore. " The Bard," who was 
anxiously awaiting the result of the foraging expedition 
ventured outside to meet him. When he beheld the 
prize, he exclaimed, in a whisper, 

" Good for you ! But you look like a murderer caught 
red-handed." 

His own words, almost before they left his lips, sug- 
gested to him an idea for a mammoth hoax — the best 
they had tried yet, he told himself. He hastily, and 
in whispers, unfolded it to " Gibs/' whom he found all 
sympathy, then returned alone, to his friends in Num- 
ber 28, reporting that he had seen nothing of their 
messenger, and expressing fear that he had met with an 
accident. 

All began to watch the door with anxiety. After 
some minutes it burst open and " Gibs," who had care- 
fully laid the gander down outside, staggered into the 



160 THE DREAMER 

room, appearing to be very drunk and brandishing a 
knife, which he had rubbed against the fowl's bleeding 
neck. ^^ Old P." and the visitor from N'orth Barracks, 
too frightened for words, sat as though rooted to their 
chairs, while " the Bard " sprang to his feet and in a 
horror-stricken voice, exclaimed, 

" Heavens, Gibs ! What has happened ? '' 
" Joe Locke — Joe Locke — " gasped " Gibs." 
"Well, what of Joe Locke? Speak man!'' 
"He won't report me any more. I'v< ""^ed him!'^ 
" Pshaw ! " exclaimed " the Bard," v ' s t. This is 
another of your practical jokes, and yc. .... -, ',t." 

" I thought you would say that, so I cut off his head 
and brought it along. Here it is ! " 

With that he quickly opened the door and picked up 
the gander and, whirling it around his head, dashed it 
violently at the one candle which was thus knocked over 
and extinguished, leaving the room in darkness but for 
a few smouldering embers on the hearth, and with the 
gruesome addition to the company of what two of those 
present believed to be the severed head of Lieutenant 
Locke. 

The visitor with one bound was out of the room 
through the window, and made good his escape to his 
own quarters in North Barracks, where he spread the 
astounding news that "Gibs" had murdered Joe Locke; 
it was certainly so, for his head was then in Number 28, 
South Barracks. 

" Old P." nearly frozen with fright, did not move 
from his place, and it was with some difficulty that " the 
Bard" and "Gibs" brought him back to a normal condi- 
tion and induced him to assist in preparing the fowl 
which had played the part of Joe Locke's head, in the 



THE DREAMER 161 

little comedy, for the belated feast — which was merrily 
partaken of, but without the gnest of honor. 

Edgar Poe had entered West Point in July, but 
hardly had its doors closed behind him when his 
optimism gave place to wretchedness and he began to 
feel that his appointment was a mistake. He had taken 
a fine stand in his classes, but he recognized at once a 
state of thin^c! most unpleasant for him for which he 
had not bef ^epared. As in his schooldays in Eich- 
mond and ^ University, a number of the boys 

had with c i u.eir intimacy from him on account of 
caste feeling, so now at West Point he found history 
repeating itself, but with a difference. In Eichmond 
and at the University it had been as the child of the 
stage and as a dependent upon charity, that the line 
was drawn against him. With the aristocratic cadets, it 
was because of his promotion from the ranks. Yet the 
very experience which brought their contempt upon 
him gave him a sense of superiority that made their 
manner toward him the harder to bear, and drilling 
with green boys after having been two years a soldier, 
he found most irksome. 

While the snubbing to which he was subjected was 
general enough to make his situation extremely un- 
pleasant, however, it was by no means unanimous. 
" Gibs " and " Old P." his convivial room-mates in 
Number 28, took him to their hearts at once, and he 
really liked them when he was in the mood for com- 
panions of their type, but they wore cruelly upon his 
nerves when the divine fire within him was burning. 
So indeed would any room-mates, for at home always, 
and most of the time at the University, one of his 



162 THE DREAMER 

chief comforts had been his own room where he could 
shut out all the world and be alone with his dreams. 

There was, at West Point, nothing like a repetition 
of his course at the University. The trouble which his 
attack of gambling fever had gotten him into had 
proved a severe but wholesome lesson, and he had let 
cards alone at once and forever. In his ignorance of 
his own family history, he did not know that for one 
of his blood, the only safety lay in total abstinence from 
the cup that cheers, but the intense and instantaneous 
excitement he found a single glass of wine produced in 
his brain — an excitement amounting almost to mad- 
ness — was in itself a warning to him, and kept him 
strictly within the bounds of moderation. 

There were times, however, when with a chicken 
and a bottle of brandy, purchased secretly from old 
Benny, and smuggled, at great hazard, into the room, 
Edgar Goodfellow could, with zest join his rolicking 
room-mates in making merry, and in spite of his strict 
adherence to the single glass, generally out-do them at 
their own games. 

But there was no place in that room for Edgar the 
Dreamer; and between the spirit-dulling routine and 
discipline of classes and drills with youths for the most 
part younger than himself and inferior in mentality 
and cultivation, but who bore themselves as his supe- 
riors, and the impossibility of an hour of solitude, the 
lovely " Ligeia " became unreal and remote. He could no 
longer catch the sounds of her voice, or feel her pres- 
ence near. His muse, too, had become shy and difficult 
and when she deigned to visit him at all, it was gen- 
erally in the quite new character of jester in cap and 
bells, under whose influence he dashed off humorous and 



THE DREAMER 163 

satirical squibs at the expense of the professors and 
students, of which the lines on Lieutenant Locke are a 
specimen. These he recited for the benefit of the 
little parties that gathered in Number 28, by whom 
they were regarded as master-pieces of wit and were 
circulated through the school. 

But he took no real pleasure in this perversion of 
his poetical gift, and feeling his soul cramped and 
cabined by the uncongeniality of his surroundings, he 
soon became convinced that West Point was not the 
place for him, and that he should leave it as soon as 
possible. He wrote Mr. Allan of his dissatisfaction — 
begging his assistance in securing a discharge. At no 
time would this request have been granted but it came 
at the most inopportune moment imaginable. 

Some time before, certain ladies in Eichmond who 
professed " to know the signs,'^ had given out the inter- 
esting news that Mr. Allan was " taking notice." True 
it was that though such a thing had seemed impossible, 
his stocks were higher and more precisely folded than 
ever, his broadcloth was of a finer texture, his knee- 
buckles shone with a brighter lustre, but the most 
marked change in him was a certain springiness of gait 
altogether new to his silk-stockinged calves, and almost 
youthful, and a pleased expression of the hitherto stem 
eyes and mouth which made his usually solemn vizage 
look as if it might break out into smiles at any moment. 

The signs, the ladies said, dated from the arrival of 
at " Powhatan," the country seat of the Mayo family, 
just below Eichmond, of a fair guest — Miss Louisa 
Patterson, of Philadelphia. This lady was no longer 
young, according to the severe standards of that time 
of early marriages and correspondingly early "old- 



164 THE DREAM EE 

maidenhood/' but so much the better, as she was there- 
fore of suitable age for the elderly though spruce and 
prosperous widower. She was, withal, a decidedly per- 
sonable woman with the elegant manners and conver- 
sation of the inner circles of the exclusive, stately 
society in which she had been nurtured — just the 
woman, the fair prophetesses said, to rule over John 
Allan (for everybody knew that a man who ruled his 
first wife was invariably ruled by his second) and to 
preside with distinction and taste over his drawing-room 
and his board. She was as suitable, in fact for the wife 
of ripe age as the flower-like Frances had been for the 
wife of youth. So Eichmond gave its unqualified ap- 
proval. 

Nothing could have been more out of harmony with 
the sound of the " mellow wedding bells " pealing for 
this happy pair, than a reminder of the first wife of 
the bridegroom in the shape of a letter from Edgar 
Poe. 

When Poe had entered West Point his foster-father 
had drawn a long breath of relief. He believed that the 
idle youth with whom his' dead wife had been so 
strangely infatuated was off his hands for good and 
all. When the letter came to jar upon his new dream 
of love he was irritated, and in his brief mention of 
the matter to his bride it was very apparent, and left 
upon her mind the impression that Frances Allan must 
have been a weak and silly creature indeed, to have 
fancied an idle, ungrateful boy who spent his time drink- 
ing, gambling and scribbling ridiculous poetry. And 
the son of an actress! It would have been impossible 
for such a low character and herself to have remained 
under the same roof for a day, she was sure, and she 



THE DREAMER 165 

told her husband so — imparting to her tone somewhat 
of the pity she felt to think of his having been yoked 
for years to such a morally frail specimen of woman- 
hood as she conceived the first Mrs. Allan to have 
been. 

So Mr. Allan's letter of refusal to help Edgar escape 
the life that was growing more and more irksome to 
him was as decided as it was brief. But Edgar was un- 
shaken in his resolve to get away as soon as possible. 
In the meantime, finding no outlet for his restless 
creative faculty that would not remain inactive though 
there was no opportunity for its satisfaction, he gave 
himself over by turns, to deepest dejection and wildest 
hilarity. 

Finally, as no other relief was at hand, he decided 
to force his discharge by deliberate and systematic 
neglect of the rules. The plan succeeded so well that 
before the session was out he was expelled from the 
Academy for disobedience of orders and failure to 
attend roll-calls, classes and guard-duty. 



166 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XVII. 

Happily, the restraints of the Academy and his 
environment there, instead of crushing out young 
Edgar's impulse to dream and to put his dreams into 
writing (as a longer period of the same restraints and 
conditions might have done) had but quickened and 
strengthened these very impulses, and he had now but 
one wish, one aspiration in regard to his newly acquired 
freedom, and that was to dedicate it to the art of litera- 
ture which had become more and more his passion and 
his mistress, and which since he had given up all idea 
of the army, he was resolved to make his sole profession. 

His first step toward this end was to arrange, before 
leaving ISTew York, for a new edition of his already 
published work, adding some hitherto unpublished 
poems which even in the unsjrmpathetic atmosphere of 
JSTumber 28 South Barracks had been undergoing a 
refining process in the seething crucible of his brain. 

The money for this venture dropped into his lap, as 
it were, for when the new friends in whom he had con- 
fided passed the word around that "the Bard" was 
going to get out a book of poetry, the cadets (in antici- 
pation of a collection of ditties cleverly hitting off the 
peculiarities and characteristics of the professors) to 
a man, subscribed in advance — at seventy-five cents 
per copy. In appreciation of their recognition of his 
genius, and little guessing what manner of book they 
expected it to be, " the Bard " gratefully dedicated the 
new volume " To the United States Corps of Cadets." 

Happy it was for him that he was not present to hear 



THE DREAMER 167 

those he had thus honored set up their throats in unani- 
mous expressions of disgust when — the dedication leaf 
turned — they were confronted by a reprint of " Tamer- 
lane " and " Al Aaraaf /' with the shorter poems, " To 
Helen/' "A Psean/' " Israfel," "Fairy-Land," and 
other " rubbish/' as they promptly pronounced the en- 
tire contents of the book. 

" Listen, fellows ! " said one of the disgusted lot, 
with the open volume in his hand. 

" ' In Heaven a spirit doth dwell 
Whose heartstrings are a lute. 

None sing so wildly well 

As the angel, Israfel, 

And the giddy stars (so legends tell) 

Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell 
Of his voice, all mute.' " 

As he finished this opening stanza of what posterity 
has ranked as one of the most exquisite lyrics in the 
English tongue, but which was received by the audience 
of cadets with guffaws of derision, the reader closed the 
book with a snap, and dashed it across the room and 
into the open fire. 

" Did you ever hear crazier rubbish ? " he asked, with 
contempt. " Highway robbery, I call it, to send us such 
stuff for our good, hard cash ! " 

" The joke's on us this time, and no doubt about it/' 
said the also chagrinned, but more philosophically in- 
clined " Gibs." " The Bard means well, though, and 
no doubt he thinks the stuff is poetry." 

" Old P." solemnly tapped his forehead with his fore- 
finger. 

" Something wrong here," he remarked, ominously, 
" I suspected it all along." 



168 THE DREAMER 

The business of getting his book published dis- 
patched, the poet's thoughts turned lovingly toward 
Eichmond which he still called " home," and carpet-bag 
in hand and a package of copies of his book which he 
intended as presents to his old chums under his arm, he 
set out upon the journey thither. 

The streets of New York had been cold and bleak 
but he told himself as he journeyed, that April days 
at home were quite different. The grass would be 
already green upon the hillsides, many of the trees in 
leaf, and the dear spring flowers in bloom. He pictured 
the ample comforts of the Allan homestead, and of his 
own room in it, with its familiar furnishings. Of 
course he had no idea of looking to Mr. Allan for 
support — his pen must give him that now — but during 
the visit which he was going to make " at home " it 
would be pleasant to sleep once more in that room with 
all of its associations, though many of these were with 
the blunders of a blinded youth. 

As he thought of Mr. Allan and his last meeting 
with him, his heart softened. He would try and keep 
their intercourse upon the friendly basis upon which 
his last sad visit home had placed it; would as far as 
possible, put himself in his foster-father's place and 
see things as he saw them. 

How desolate the widowed man had seemed in the 
big, empty house during those chill, sorrow-stricken, 
February days ! No wonder he had sought escape from 
his desolation in another marriage — his loneliness 
without the lovely little mother must have been unbear- 
able. What was the new wife like, he wondered? Was 
she like the lady of the manor he remembered? Could 



THE DREAMER 169 

there be another such gentle, tender, flower-like woman 
on earth? 

In his unworldl}^, unpractical dreamer's soul it did 
not occur to him for one moment that her existence 
might make him any less Mr. Allan's adopted son, or 
even that, with all the rooms in the big house at her 
disposal, she might have taken a fancy to rearrange 
the one which, from the time the house became Mr. 
Allan's property, had been " Eddie's room," and which 
had so long stood ready for his occupancy — dedicated 
as it was to his own belongings. 

At last he was on the sacred soil! 

How fair and comfortable the old homestead looked 
in its setting of greening lawn and flowering garden, 
with the pleasant sunshine of the April afternoon over 
all! How cheerful — how ample — how homelike! 

He ran up the steps of the commodious front porch 
and was on the point of opening the door when some 
impulse he could not define made him pause and, in- 
stead of turning the knob, announce himself with a rap 
upon the shining brass knocker. 

One of the old family servants whom he had known 
and loved from his infancy, and with whom he had 
always been a pet, opened the door, and with beaming 
face and eager voice greeted him with the enthusiastic 
hospitality of his kind — lifting up his voice and his 
hands in praise to God that he was once more in this 
world permitted to look upon the face of " Marse 
Eddie." 

The whilom young master of the house was equally, 
if less picturesquely, warm in his expressions of pleas- 
ure at seeing the old man again, and gave him his carpet- 



170 TEE DREAMER 

bag with instructions to take it to his room and to tell 
Mrs. Allan that he was there. 

The venerable darkey's face fell. The '^ new Mistis " 
had "changed the house around some," he explained, 
apologetically, and " Marse's Eddie's " things had been 
moved to one of the servants' rooms, but "Marse 
Eddie's old room was a guest chamber, and he "reck- 
oned " that would be the place to take the bag. 

The visitor's whole manner changed at once — froze. 
The flush of pleasure died out of his face and left it 
pale, cold and stem. A fierce and unreasonable rage 
possessed him. -She had dismantled the room that his 
little mother had arranged for him and sent his things 
to a servant's room! Was this insult intentional, he 
wondered ? 

To his mind, his " little Mother " was so entirely the 
presiding genius of the place — he could not realize the 
right of anyone, not even a "new mistis," to come in 
and " change the house around." 

Cut to the quick, he directed the old butler to leave 
the bag where it was and to let Mrs Allan know that 
he was in the drawing-room. 

No announcement could have given that lady greater 
surprise. She regarded Edgar's leaving West Point 
after her husband's letter, as direct disobedience, and 
his presenting himself at her door as the height of 
impertinence. Something of this was in the frigid 
dignity with which she received him — standing, and 
drawn up to the full height of her imposing figure. 

She had never been within speaking distance of any- 
one drunk to the point of intoxication, but, somehow, 
she had received an impression that this was pretty 
generally the case with the young man now before her. 



TEE DREAMER 171 

and when he began somewhat incoherently (in his fool- 
ish rage) to ask her confirmation of the old servant's 
statement that his room had been dismantled, she was 
convinced that it was his condition at the moment. 
Turnings with the grand air for which she was noted, 
to the hoary butler who stood in the doorway between 
drawing-room and hall^ respectfully awaiting orders as 
to " Marse Eddie's " bag, she said, 

" Put this drunken man out of the house ! " 

The aged slave stood aghast. Between the stately 
new mistress whom it was his duty to serve, and the 
beloved young master whose home-coming had warmed 
his old heart, what should he do ? 

He stood in silence, his lined black face filled with 
sadness, his chin in his hand, his eyes bent in sorrow 
and shame upon the floor. What should he do? — 

Fortunately, the new mistress did not see his inde- 
cision as she swept from the room, and " Marse Eddie " 
quickly relieved him of the embarrassing dilemma by 
picking up the carpet-bag and passing out of the door, 
closing it behind him. 

It was all a mistake — a miserable mistake ; but 
one of those mistakes in understanding between blind, 
prejudiced human beings by which hearts are broken, 
souls lost. 

At the foot of the steps Edgar Poe paused and looked 
back at the massive closed door. Never — nevermore, 
it seem to say to him. — Never — nevermore! 

While he had been inside the house one of those 
sudden changes in the face of nature of which his 
superstitious soul always made note, had taken place. 
A shower from a passing cloud had filled the depres- 
sions in the uneven pavement, where before only sun- 



172 THE DREAMER 

shine lay, with little pools of water, and had left the 
trees " weeping/' as he fancifully described them to him- 
self. 

He walked along the wet streets for a few steps, by 
the side of the wall that enclosed house and grounds. 
Then he paused again and looked over into the dripping 
garden while he held consultation with himself as to 
what he should do next. As he looked the breath of 
drenched violets greeted his nostrels. He noticed that 
the lilacs were coming into blossom. The fruit trees 
already stood like brides veiled in their fresh bloom. 
The tulip and hyacinth and daffodil beds were gay 
with color. How their newly washed faces shone in the 
sunshine, just then bursting through the clouds ! 

[N'ear him, just inside the wall, was a bed of lily-of- 
the-valley. He was seized with an almost irresistible 
desire to go down upon his knees by it and search among 
the glistening green leaves to see if the lilies were in 
bloom. 

But the garden-gate, like the house door, was closed 
upon him and seemed to repeat the fateful word — 
Nevermore. 

Whither should he turn his steps? To Mr. Allan's 
office ? — Never ! 

His intention had been to submit himself to Mr. 
Allan as far as his self-respect would let him. To 
consult him in regard to the literary career he felt him- 
self committed to now that (as he recalled with satis- 
faction) the bridges between him and any other profes- 
sion were burnt behind him. His own plan, upon which 
he was resolved to ask Mr. Allan's opinion, would be to 
seek a position in the line of journalism which would 



TEE DREAMER 173 

I 
give him a living while he was waiting for his more 
ambitious work to find buyers. 

But since the interview with Mrs. Allan he realized 
the folly of this dream. 

Then, whither should he go ? — To the chums of his 
boyhood ? — Rob Stanard, Dick Ambler, Rob Sully, Jack 
Preston, where were they? — Good, dear friends they 
had been, but it seemed so long since they had played 
together! What should they find to say to each other 
now? ' They were busy with their various avocations 
and interests — what room in their hearts and homes 
could there be for a wanderer like himself? 

At the age of one and twenty, at the springtime of 
his life, as of the year — he felt himself to be as friend- 
less, as much a stranger in the city which he called 
home, as Rip Van Winkle after his long sleep had felt 
in his. The only spots toward which he could 
turn with any confidence for sympathy were those two 
quiet cities within this city where lay his loved and 
lovely dead — " The doubly dead in that they died so 
young.'' 

" How different my life would be if they had lived ! " 
he murmured to the flowers. 

Yet how fair was this world in which he had no place 
— even to a mere looker-on. How fair was this man- 
sion, in its setting of April green and bloom, which 
had once owned him as its young — its future master. 
Above it Hope stretched her shining wings, but the hope 
was not for him. For him the closed door and the 
closed gate said only, ^'^no more — nevermore." 

But whither should he go? — whither? 

As he turned from the garden and walked slowly, 
aimlessly, down the street, his great grey eyes fixed 



174 THE DREAMER 

ponderingly upon the breaking clouds, a rainbow — • 
bright symbol of promise — spanned the heavens. His 
eyes widened;, his lips parted at the wonder and the 
beauty and the suddenness of it. 

Whither should he go ? Behold an answer meet for a 
poet ! 

Whither ? — Whither ? — The dark eyes in the pale 
cameo face turned skyward — the eyes of him who had 
declared himself to be a deep worshipper of all beauty 
grew more dreamy. Whither, indeed, but to the end of 
the rainbow ! 

By what " path obscure and lonely," the quest would 
lead him he knew not, but he would follow it to the 
bitter end, for there, perchance, he would find if not 
the traditional pot of gold, at least a wreath of laurel. 

As he wandered down the street, his eyes still upon 
the bow, his dream was suddenly interrupted by the 
hearty voice of one of his boyhood^s friends, and his 
sister Eosalie's adopted brother. Jack Mackenzie. 

" Hello, Edgar ! " he cried. " Did you drop from 
the clouds? Evidently, for I see your head is still in 
them." 

He returned the greeting with joy. How good it was 
to feel the hand-clasp of friendship and welcome ! He 
had always liked Jack — for the moment he loved him. 

" And where are you bound — you and yoi;r bag ? " 
asked Jack. " Not to Mr. Allan's, for you are going 
in the wrong direction." 

" No," replied The Dreamer, with a whimsical smile. 
" I was going there, but I found the door shut, so I 
changed my mind, and had just decided to make the 
end of the rainbow my destination." 

Jack's spontaneous laugh rang out. " The same 



THE DREAMER 175 

old Edgar ! " he said. " Well I won't interfere with your 
journey except to defer it a bit. You are going home 
with me, to ^ Duncan Lodge/ now — at least to supper 
and spend the night; and to stay as much longer as 
pleases you. Rose and the rest will be delighted to see 
you." 



176 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



Where was Edgar Poe? Again the question was 
being asked. In many quarters and with varying de- 
grees of interest it was repeated. But it still remained 
unanswered. 

In Richmond it was asked by the chums of his youth 
as they sat under their comfortable vines and fig-trees, 
or stopped each other on a corner for a few moments' 
social chat, or — catching some one of the rumors that 
were afloat concerning the gifted companion of their 
golden days — looked up from their desks in office or 
counting-house to ask each other the question. Their 
faces were keen with interest for their admiration and 
affection for The Dreamer had been sincere; yet it was 
not strong enough after the lapse of years to make any 
one of them lay down work and go forth to seek a solu- 
tion of the mystery. Such an errand not one of them 
felt to be his business. A quixotic errand it would in- 
deed have been considered and one which, if half the 
rumors were true, might have necessitated a journey 
to the ends of the earth, to prove but a fool's errand 
after all. 

The oft-repeated question was one with which John 
Allan little concerned himself. A robust son and heir 
had come in his late middle age to fill all his thoughts 
with new interest and plans for the present and the 
future. The patter of little feet of his own child on 
the stairs and halls of his home, drowned the ghostly 
memories of other and less welcome footfalls that had 
once echoed there. 



THE DREAMER 177 

He too, had heard rumors of the adventures and the 
misadventures of Edgar Poe, but he did not consider it 
his business, as it was certainly not his pleasure, to in- 
vestigate them. 

In Baltimore too," the question was asked by the kins- 
folk whose acquaintance Edgar had made during his 
visit there. But they had never held themselves in the 
least responsible for this eccentric son of their brother 
David, the actor — the black sheep of the family. Surely 
it was none of their business to follow him upon any 
chase his foolish fancy might lead him. 

But still, when the rumors that were rife reached 
their ears, it was with no small degree of curiosity that 
they asked each other the question : Where was Edgar 
Poe? — What had become of him? — Had he, as some 
believed, met death upon the high seas or in a foreign 
land ? — Was he the real hero of stories of adventure 
which floated across the ocean from Russia — from 
France — from Greece ? 

He had certainly contemplated going abroad — the 
Superintendent of West Point Academy had had a let- 
ter from him sometime after he left there, declaring his 
intention of seeking an appointment in the Polish 
army. Had he gone, or was he, as some would have it, 
going in and out among them, there in Baltimore, but 
unknown and unrecognized — his identity hidden under 
assumed name and ingenious disguise? 

Who could tell? 

The wonder of it was not in the existence of the un- 
answered question — of the mystery — but that the ques- 
tion could remain unanswered — the mystery remain un- 
solved — and no attempt be made to lift the veil. That 
a young man, a gentleman, of prominent connections. 



178 TEE DREAMER 

of handsome features and distinguished bearing and 
address, of rare mental gifts and cultivation, and of 
magnetic personality, could disappear from the face of 
the earth — could, almost before the very eyes of his 
fellows, step from the glare of the world in which he 
moved into the abyss of absolute obscurity or impene- 
trable mystery, and create no stir — that no one should 
deem it his or her business to seek or to find an answer 
to the question, a reading of the riddle. 

Not until two years after Edgar Poe had turned his 
back upon the closed door of the Allan mansion, in 
Eichmond, and stepped, as it seemed from the edge of 
a world in which he was not wanted into the unknown, 
did such an one arise. And that one was, as an espe- 
cially good friend of Edgar Poe^s was most likely to be 
— a woman. 

Between this woman^ — Mrs. Maria Poe Clemm — a 
widow of middle age, and The Dreamer, there existed 
the close blood-tie of aunt and nephew, for she was the 
own sister of his father, David Poe. 

More than that — there existed, though they had never 
seen each other, a soul kinship rare between persons of 
the same blood, and which (for all they had never seen 
each other) she, with the woman's unerring instinct 
that sometimes seems akin to inspiration, divined. She 
too was something of a dreamer, with an ear for the 
voices of JSTature and a mind open to the influences of 
its beauty, but with a goodly ballast of strong common 
sense. 

She was but a young girl when her handsome and 
idolized brother David scandalized the family by marry- 
ing an actress and himself taking to the stage. But she 
had seen the betwitching " Miss Arnold '^ at the theatre 



THE DREAMER 179 

in Baltimore — had^ with fascinated eyes, followed her 
twinkling feet through the mazy dance, had listened 
with charmed ears to her exquisite voice, had sat spell- 
bound under her acting. To her childish mind, the 
stage had become a fairy-land and Miss Arnold its 
presiding genius. That brother David should love and 
marry her seemed like something out of a fairy book. 
She did not blame brother David; she secretly entirely 
approved of him. 

In her later years the death of the husband of her 
own youth who had been romantically, passionately 
loved, had left her penniless but not disillusioned; 
with her own living to get and a little daughter with a 
face like a Luca Delia Eobbia chorister, and a voice 
that went with the face, but who had the requirements 
of other flesh and blood children, to be provided for. 
This child was the sunshine of the lonely widow's life, 
yet she only in part filled the great mother's heart of 
her. Nature had made her to be the mother of a son 
as well as a daughter, then mockingly, it would seem, 
denied her. 

But in her dreams she worshipped the son she had 
never borne, and deep in her heart was stored, like 
unshed tears, the love she would have lavished upon him 
had her whole mission in life been fulfilled. 

She had heard little of her brother David's son Edgar, 
but that little had always interested her. She was 
living away from Baltimore during his visit there just 
before he entered West Point, and so she did not meet 
him; but upon the death of her husband, soon after- 
ward, she had returned to the home of her girlhood, 
and established herself in modest, but respectable quar- 



180 THE DREAMER 

ters, to earn a livelihood for the little Virginia and her- 
self by the use of her skillful needle. 

It was soon afterward that with a concern which no 
one but herself had felt, she learned of the mystery 
surrounding the whereabouts of her nephew. 

She yearned over the wanderer and longed to mother 
him, as, somehow, she knew he needed to be mothered. 
She kept near her a copy of his last little book of poems 
which she had read again and again. In the earlier 
ones she saw a loose handful of jewels in the rough, 
yet she recognized the sparkle which distinguishes the 
genuine from the false. In the later ones she perceived 
gems " of purest ray serene/' polished and strung and 
ready to be passed on from generation to generation — 
priceless heir-looms. 

She was a tall woman, and deep-bosomed, with large 
but clear-cut and strong features, and handsome, deep- 
set gray eyes which habitually wore the expression of 
one who has loved much and sorrowed much. She had 
been called stately before her proud spirit had bowed 
itself in submission to the chastenings of grief — since 
when she had borne the seal of meekness. But there 
was a distinction about her that neither grief nor 
poverty could destroy. She was so unmistakably the 
gentle-woman. In the simple, but dainty white cap, 
with its floating strings, which modestly covered her 
dark waving hair, the plain black dress and prim collar 
fastened with its mourning pin, she made a reposeful 
picture of the old-fashioned conception of " a widow 
indeed." 

Her hands were not her least striking feature. They 
were large, but perfectly modelled, and they were deft- 
capable, full of character and feeling. In their touch 



TEE DREAMER 181 

there was a wonderfully soothing quality. In winter 
they always possessed just the pleasantest degree of 
warmth; in summer just the most grateful degree of 
coolness. No one ever received a greeting from them 
without being impressed with the friendliness, the 
sympathy of their clasp. 

As she bent her fine, deeply-lined face over them, and 
the work they held, while the little Virginia sat nursing 
a doll at her feet, she often stitched into the garments 
that they fashioned yearnings, thoughts, questionings 
of the youth — ^her brother's child — whose picture, as 
she had conceived him from descriptions she had heard, 
she carried in her heart. She knew too well the weak- 
ness that was his inheritance and she knew too, what 
perils were in waiting to ensnare the feet of untried 
youth — poor, homeless and without the restraining in- 
fluences of friends and kindred — whatever their inheri- 
tance might be. 

Sometimes she felt that the yearning was almost 
more than she could bear, and that she must arise and go 
forth and seek this straying sheep of the fold of Poe. 
But alas, she was but a woman, without money and 
without a clue upon which to begin to work save such as 
wild, improbable and contradictory rumors afforded. 
That was, after all, what she most needed — a clue. If 
she could only find a clue, poor as she was, she would 
follow it to the ends of the earth ! 

Upon a summer^s day two years after Edgar's dis- 
appearance, and when she had almost given up hope, 
the clue came. It was placed in her hand by her cousin, 
and Edgar's, Neilson Poe, who had no faith in its value 
but passed it on to her as it had come to him — '^ for 
what it was worth," as he expressed it. 



182 THE DREAMER 

It was a strange story that Mrs. Clemm's cousin 
Neilson told her, and which had been told him, he said, 
by an acquaintance of his from Richmond who had 
known Edgar Poe in his boyhood. 

It seems that this Richmond man had during a visit 
to Baltimore gone to a brickyard to arrange for the 
shipment home of bricks for a new house he was build- 
ing. As he sat in the office talking to the manager of 
the yard, a line of men bearing freshly molded bricks 
to the kiln passed the open window. There was some- 
thing about the appearance of one of the laborers that 
struck the Richmond man as familiar and he turned 
quickly to the manager and asked the name of the man, 
pointing him out. The name given him was a strange 
one to him and he dismissed the matter from his 
thoughts and returned to his business talk. 

Upon his way to his hotel, however, the appearance 
of the brick-carrier, and the impression that somewhere, 
he had seen him before, returned to his mind and it 
came upon him in a flash, first that the likeness was to 
Edgar Poe, and then the conviction that the man was 
none other than Poe himself, though emaciated and 
aged to a degree that, with his shabby dress and un- 
shaven chin, made him scarcely recognizable. Though 
he had been but a casual acquaintance of Edgar's, he 
was deeply touched at seeing him so evidently in dis- 
tress, and returned to the brickyard early the next 
morning for the purpose of speaking to him and of help- 
ing him back into the sphere in which he belonged and 
from which he had so long disappeared. But the man 
he sought was not there and no one knew where his 
lodgings were. He was a recent employe of the yard, 
they said, and so gloomy and unsociable that he had 



TEE DREAMER 183 

made no friends. He was capable of a great amount of 
work, which he performed faithfully, but kept to himself 
and had little to say to anybody. 

Upon the day before he had looked ill and had stopped 
work before the day was over. He was evidently suffer- 
ing from exhaustion, but had declared that he needed 
nothing, and after sitting down to rest upon a pile of 
bricks for a while, had gone off to his home — wherever 
that might be — as usual, alone. 

This story JSTeilson Poe set down as highly sensational. 
He did not believe, he said with a laugh, that his cousin, 
when found, would be doing anything half so energetic 
or useful as carrying bricks — he would have more hope 
of him if he could believe it. The laborer's real, or 
fancied, likeness to Edgar was but a case of chance re- 
semblance, that was all. 

But that was not enough for Maria Clemm. She 
folded her sewing and laid it away with an air of 
finality which plainly said that she had found other and 
more pressing work to do. The sewing must wait a 
more convenient season. 

Then she went out into the streets sweltering in the 
summer heat, and turned her face toward that obscure 
quarter of the town where human beings who could not 
afford to rest or to dine might at least secure a corner in 
which to " lodge " and the right, if not the appetite, to 
"eat," for an infinitesimal sum; for it was in this 
quarter that strange as it might seem, her instinct told 
her her search must be made — in this quarter that 
Edgar Poe, the rich merchant's pampered foster-child, 
Edgar Poe, the poet, the scholar, the exquisite in dress, 
in taste and in manners, would be found. 



184 THE DREAMER 

When she did find him the mystery that had sur- 
rounded him was stripped of the last shred of its 
romance. In a room compared to which the little cham- 
ber back of the shop of Mrs. Fipps, the milliner, in 
which his mother had drawn her last breath, and in 
which Frances Allan had found and fallen in love with 
him, was luxurious, he lay upon a bed of straw thrown 
into a dark corner, tossing with fever and in his deli- 
rium, literally " babbling of green fields." 

The kind-hearted, but ignorant and uncleanly slattern 
who sought with " lodgings to let " to keep the souls of 
herself and family in their bodies, gave him as much 
attention as the demands of a numerous brood of little 
slatterns and a drunken husband would permit, and 
sighed with real sorrow as she admitted that the " poor 
gentleman " was in a very bad way. It was her opinion 
he had seen better days she confided to the three other 
lodgers who were just then renting the three straw beds 
in the three other corners of the same dark, squalid and 
evil-smelling room. He was " so soft-spoken and ele- 
gant-like, if he was poor as a church mouse. Pity he 
had no folks nor nobody to keer nothin' about ^im." 

It was not at once that Mrs. Clemm found him. She 
had sought him diligently in what would to-day be 
known as the slum districts of the city, descending the 
scale of respectability lower and lower until she thought 
she had reached the bottom, but without success. 

Then, upon the fourth or fifth day of her search, late 
in the afternoon, when the little Virginia was watching 
anxiously from the sitting-room window for " Muddle's " 
return, a wagon stopped before her door and out of it 
and into the house was borne a stretcher upon which lay 
an apparently dying man — ghastly, unshaven, and mut- 
tering broken unintelligible sentences. 



THE DREAMER 185 

Keeping pace with the wagon as it crept along the 
street, might have been seen the stately, sad-eyed Widow 
Clemm. When the wagon stopped, she stopped, and 
directed the careful lifting of the stretcher from it. 
Then she turned and opened the door of her small house 
and led the way to her neat bed-chamber where, upon 
her own immaculate bed, the sick man was gently laid — 
henceforth, as long as need be, a cot in the sitting-room 
would be good enough for her. 

The little Virginia, her soft eyes filled with wonder, 
had followed her mother upon tip-toe. 

"Who is it, Muddie?" she questioned in an awed 
whisper. 

The anxiety in the widow's face gave place to a look 
of exaltation which fairly transfigured her. Her deep 
eyes shone with the hoarded love for the son so long 
denied her. She gathered her little daughter to her 
breast and kissed her tenderly. 

" It is your brother, darling," she gently said. " God 
has given me a son ! " 

Well she knew that he was not yet entirely her own — 
that she would have to wrestle fiercely with Death for 
his possession. But she had made up her mind that 
she would win the battle. 

"Death shall not have him," she passionately told 
herself. 

But the next moment, overwhelmed with a realization 
of human helplessness, she was upon her knees at his 
bedside, crying: 

" Oh, God, do not let him die ! I have but just found 
him ! Spare him to me now, if but a little while ! " 



186 THE DRE AMER 



CHAPTEE XIX. 

For many days the sick man lay with eyes closed in 
uneasy sleep or open, but unseeing, and with body writh- 
ing and tongue loosed but incoherent, showing that 
these half-waking hours, as well as the sleeping ones, 
were "horror haunted." 

Finally the most terrible of dreams visited him. The 
circumstances of his life had caused him from his 
infancy to dwell much upon the subject of death. He 
had oftentimes taken a gruesome pleasure in trying to 
imagine all the sensations of the grim passage into the 

" Valley of the Shadow " — even to the closing of the 
coffin-lid and the descent into the grave. Now, in his 
fever-dream, the dreadful details and sensations ima- 
gined in health came to him, but with tenfold vivid- 
ness. At the point when in the blackness and suffoca- 
tion of conscious burial horror had reached its extremest 
limit and the sufferer was upon the verge of real death 
from sheer terror, relief came. He seemed to feel him- 
self freed from the closeness, the maddening fight for 
breath, of the coffin, and gently, surely, borne upward 
out of the abyss .... upward .... upward .... 
into air — light — life ! 

For a long while he lay quite still, too exhausted to 
move hand or foot — to raise his eyelids even ; but con- 
tent — more — happy, perfectly happy, in the glorious 
consciousness of being able just to lie still and breathe 
the sweet air of day. 

Presently, as he began to feel rested, the great grey 
eyes opened. For the first time since the conqueror. 



TEE DREAMER 187 

Fever, had overthrown him and bound him to the uneasy- 
bed of straw, they were clear as the sky after a storm — 
swept clean of every cob-web clond; but their lucid 
depths were filled with surprise, for they opened upon 
a cool, light, homelike chamber. The walls around him 
were white, but were relieved here and there by restful 
prints in narrow black frames. The four-post bed upon 
which he lay was canopied and the large, bright win- 
dows were curtained with snowiest dimity, but the 
draperies of both were drawn and he could look out at 
the trees and the sky now roseate with the hues of even- 
ing. In a set of shelves that nearly reached the ceiling 
stood row on row of friendly looking books. Upon a 
high mahogany chest of drawers, with its polished brass 
trimmings and little swinging looking-glass, stood a 
white and gold porcelain vase filled with asters — purple, 
white and pink — while before it, in a deep arm-chair, 
a little girl of ten or eleven years, with a face like a 
Luca della Eobbia chorister, or like one of the children 
of sunny Italy that served for old Luca's model, was 
curled up, stroking a large white cat which lay purring 
in her lap. 

Upon the child the wondering eyes of the sick man 
lingered longest and to her they returned when their 
survey of the rest of the room was done. Suddenly, 
impelled by the steadiness of his gaze, she lifted her 
own dark, soft eyes and let them rest for a moment 
upon his. She started — then was up and across the 
floor in a flash, carrying the cat upon her shoulder. 

"Muddie, Muddie," she cried from the door, "The 
new Buddie is awake ! " 

Then, still carrying her pet, she walked, to his bed- 
side and gazed earnestly and unabashed into the "new 



188 THE DREAMER 

Buddie's " face. Her eyes had the velvety softness of 
pansy petals and as they looked into the eyes of the 
sick man recalled to his clearing mind the expression 
of mixed love and questioning in the eyes of his 
spaniel, ^^ Comrade," the faithful friend of his boy- 
hood. 

At length he spoke. 

"Who is ^Muddie'?" 

" She's my mother, and you are my new brother 
that has come to live with us always." 

A radiant smile illumined the pale and haggard face. 
" Thank Heaven for that ! ■" he said. " And who 
brought me up out of the grave ? " 

The child was spared the necessity of puzzling ovei 
this startling question. Surely it was no other than 
she, he thought — she who at this moment appeared 
at the open door — the tall figure of a woman or 
angel who in the next moment was kneeling beside 
him with a heaven of protecting love in her face. She 
it was, no other! Through all of his dreams he had 
been dimly conscious of her — saving him from death 
and despair. Now for the first time, in the light of 
life, and in his new consciousness he saw her plainly. 

Edgar Poe's convalescence was slow but it was 
steady, and even in his weakness he felt a peace and 
happiness such as he had rarely tasted. This frugal 
but restful home in which he found himself, with the 
ministrations of " Muddie " and " Sissy," as he play- 
fully called his aunt and the little cousin who had 
adopted him as her " Buddie," were to him, after his 
struggle with hunger, fever and death, like a safe 
harbor to a storm-tossed sailor. 

The little Virginia claimed him as her own from 



THE DREAMER 189 

the beginning. As long as he was weak enough to 
need to be waited upon her small feet and hands 
never wearied in his service but as he grew better, it 
was he who served her. There never were such stories 
as he could tell, such games as he could play, and he 
took her cat to his heart with gratifying promptness. 
When they walked out together the world seemed 
turned into a fairyland as with her hand held fast in 
his he told her wonderful secrets about the clouds, the 
trees, the flowers, the birds and even about the stones 
under her feet. It was fascinating to her too, to lie 
and listen to him read and talk with " Muddie." She 
was not wise enough to understand much that they 
said, but at night, when she had been tucked into 
bed, he would sit under the lamp and read aloud 
from one of the books in the shelves, or from the long 
strips of paper upon which he wrote and wrote; and 
though she did not understand the words, she de- 
lighted to listen, for his voice made the sweetest lullaby 
music. 

With the return of health and strength, energy and 
the impulse for life's battle began to return to Edgar 
Poe, and with them a new incentive. He began to 
awaken to the fact that " Muddie " and " Sissy '' were 
poor and that his presence in their home was making 
them poorer — that the struggle to support this modest 
establishment was a severe one, and that he must 
arise and add what he could to the earnings of the 
deft needle. The three little editions of his poems 
had brought him no money — he had begun to despair 
of their ever bringing him any. He had sometime since 
turned his attention to prose but the manuscripts of 
•such stories as he had offered the publishers had come 
back to him with unflattering promptness. He began 



190 TEE DREAMER 

now, however, with fresh heart to write and to arrange 
a number of those that seemed to him to be his best, 
for a book, to which he proposed to give the title, 
" Tales of the Folio Club/' 

But the new tide of hope was soon at a low ebb. 
The editors and publishers would have none of his 
work. 

When the repeated return to him of the stories, 
poems and essays he sent out had begun to make him 
lose faith in their merit and to question his own right 
to live since the world had no use for the only com- 
modity he was capable of producing, "Muddie" came 
in one evening with an unusually bright, eager look 
in her eyes and a copy of The Saturday Visitor (a 
weekly paper published in Baltimore) in her hand. 

^' Here's your chance, Eddie/' she said. 

In big capitals upon the first page of the paper 
was an announcement to the effect that the Visitor 
would give two prizes — one of one hundred dollaris 
for the best short story, and one of fifty dollars for 
the best poem submitted to it anon3rmously. Three 
well-known gentlemen of the city would act as judges, 
and the names of the successful contestants would be 
published upon the twelfth of October. 

With trembling hands the discouraged young appli- 
cant for place as an author made a neat parcel of six 
of his " Tales of the Folio Club " and a recently writ- 
ten poem, " The Coliseum," and left them, that very 
night, at the door of the office of The Saturday Visitor. 

How eagerly he and " Muddie " and " Sissy " 
awaited the fateful twelfth! The hours and the days 
dragged by on leaden wings. But the twelfth came at 
last. It found Edgar Poe at the office of the Visitor 
an hour before time for the paper to be issued, but 



THE DREAMER 191 

at length lie held the scarcely dry sheet in his hand 
and there, with his name at the end, was the story 
that had taken the prize— ''The MS. Found in a 
Bottle." 

More ! — In the following wonderful — most won- 
derful words, it seemed to him — the judges declared 
their decision: 

" Among the prose articles were many of various and 
distinguished merit, but the singular force and beauty 
of those sent by the author of 'Tales of the Folio Club' 
leave us no room for hesitation in that department. 
We have awarded the premium to a tale entitled, 'The 
MS. Found in a Bottle.' It would hardly be doing 
justice to the writer of this collection to say that the 
tale we have chosen is the best of the six offered by 
him. We cannot refrain from saying that the author 
owes it to his own reputation as well as to the gratifi- 
cation of the community to publish the entire volume. 
These tales are eminently distinguished by a wild, 
vigorous and poetical imagination, a rich style, a fer- 
tile invention and varied, curious learning. 

(Signed) John P. Kennedy, 
J. H. B. Latrobe, 
James H. Miller, 

Committee/' 

Here was the fulfilment of hope long deferred! 
Here was a brimming cup of joy which the widowed 
aunt and little cousin who had taken him in and 
made him a son and brother could share with him ! It 
seemed almost too good to be true, yet there it was in 
plain black and white with the signatures of the three 
gentlemen whose opinion everyone would respect, at 
the end. What wealth that hundred dollars — the 



192 THE DREAMER 

first earnings of his pen — seemed. T\Tiat comforts 
for the modest home it would buy! This was no 
mere nod of recognition from the literary would, but a 
cordial hand-clasp, drawing him safely within that 
magic, but hitherto frowning portal. 

He felt as if he were walking on air as he hurried 
home to tell " Muddie " and " Sissy " of his and their 
good fortune. And how proud " Muddie " was of her 
boy ! How lovingly little " Sissy " hung on his neck 
and gave him kisses of congratulation — though but 
little realizing the significance of his success. And 
how he, in turn, beamed upon them! The grey 
eyes had lost all of their melancholy and seemed sud- 
denly to have become wells of sunshine. In imagina- 
tion he pictured these loved ones raised forever from 
want, for he told himself that he would not only sell 
for a goodly price all the rest of the " Tales of the 
Folio Club," but under the happy influence of his suc- 
cess he would write many more and far better stories 
still, to be promptly exchanged for gold. 

Bright and early Monday morning he made ready 
(with "Muddle's" aid) for a round of visits to the 
members of the committee, to thank them for their 
kind words. His clothes, hat, boots and gloves were 
all somewhat worse for wear and his old coat hung 
loosely upon his shoulders — wasted as they still were 
by the effects of his long illness; but he whistled while 
he brushed and " Muddie " darned and carefully inked 
the worn seams, and finally it was with a feeling that 
he was quite presentable that he kissed his hands to 
his two good angels and ran gaily down the steps. 
Hope gave him a debonair mein that belied his shabby- 
genteel apparel. 

A quarter of an hour later Mr. John Kennedv, 



THE DREAMER 193 

prominent lawyer and the author of that pleasant book 
" Swallow Barn/' then newly published and the talk 
of the town, answered a knock upon his office door with 
a quick, ^^ Come in ! " 

At the same time he raised his eyes and confronted 
those of the young author whom he had been instru- 
mental in raising from the " verge of despair." 

The face of the older man was one of combined 
strength and amiability. Evidences of talent were 
there, but combined with common sense. There was 
benevolence in the expansive brow and kindliness and 
humor as well as character, about the lines of the 
nose and the wide, full-lipped mouth, and the eyes 
diffused a light which was not only bright but genial, 
and which robbed them of keenness as they rested 
upon the pathetic and at the same time distinguished 
figure before him. What the kindly eyes took in a 
glance was that the pale and haggard young stranger 
with the big brow and eyes and the clear-cut features, 
the military carriage and the shabby, but neat, frock 
coat buttoned to the throat where it met the fashion- 
able black stock, and with the modest and exquisite 
manners, was a gentleman and a scholar — but poor, 
probably even hungry. They kindled with added in- 
terest when the visitor introduced himself as Edgar 
Poe^ the author of " Tales of the Folio Club." 

The strong, pleasant face and the cordial hand that 
grasped his own, then placed a chair for him, invited 
the young author's confidence — a confidence that al- 
ways responded promptly to kindness — and he had 
soon poured into the attentive ear of John Kennedy 
not only profuse thanks for the encouraging words in 
the Visitor but his whole history. Deeply touched by 
the young man's refined and intellectual beauty — par- 



194 THE DREAMER 

tially obscured as it was by the unmistakable marks of 
illness and want — by his frank, confiding manners, 
by the evidences in thought and expression of gifts 
of a high order, and by the moving story he told, Mr. 
Kennedy^s heart went out to him and he sent him on 
his way to pay his respects to the other members of 
the committee^ rejoicing in offers of friendship and 
hospitalit}^ and promises of aid in securing publishers 
for his writings. 

Edgar Poe had been loved of women, he had been 
adored by small boys, he had received many material 
benefits from his foster father^, he had been kindly 
treated by his teachers^ but he was now for the first 
time taken by the hand spiritually as well as physi- 
cally, by a man, a man of mental and moral force and 
of position in the world; a man, moreover, who with 
rare divination appreciated, out of his own strength, 
the weaknesses and the needs as well as the gifts and 
graces of his new acquaintance, and who took his 
dreams and ambitions seriously. The sane, whole- 
some companionship which The Dreamer found in him 
and at his hospitable fireside acted like a tonic upon 
his spirits and improvement in his health both of mind 
and body were rapid. 

Though warning him against being over much 
elated at his success, and an expectation of growing 
suddenly either rich or famous, Mr. Kennedy was as 
good as his word in regard to helping him find a 
market for his work. A proud moment it was when 
the young author received a note from his patron 
inviting him to dine with Mr. Wilmer, the editor of 
The Saturday Visitor which had given him the prize, 
and some other gentlemen of the profession of jour- 
nalism. But his pleasure was followed by quick morti- 



THE DREAMER 195 

fication. What should he wear? Still holding the 
open note in his hand, he looked down ruefully at his 
clothes — his only ones. For all their brushing and 
darning they were unmistakably shabby — utterly unfit 
to grace a dinner-party. Nearly all of the hundred 
dollars which had seemed such a fortune had already 
been spent to pay bills incurred during his illness and 
to buy provisions for the bare little home which had 
sheltered him in his need and which had become so 
dear to his heart. I^o, he could not go to the dinner, 
but what excuse could he make that would seem to 
Mr. Kennedy sufficient to warrant him in not only de- 
clining his hospitality but putting from him the chance 
of meeting the editor of the Visitor under such 
auspices ? 

At length he decided that in this case absolute 
frankness was his only course. 

" My dear Mr. Kennedy/' he wrote, 

" Your invitation to dinner has wounded me 
to the quick. I cannot come for reasons of the most 
humiliating nature — my personal appearance. You 
may imagine my mortification in making this dis- 
closure to you, but it is necessary." 

As he was about, in bitterness of soul, to add his 
signature a sudden thought caused him to pause, pen 
poised in air. A thought ? — A temptation would per- 
haps be a better word. It bade him consider carefully 
before throwing away his chance. Who knew, who 
could tell, it questioned, how much might depend upon 
this meeting? His fortune might be made by it! Al- 
most certainly it would lead to the sale of some more 
of his stories to the Visitor. Mr. Kennedy believed 
that it would have this result — for this purpose he 
had arranged it. After taking so much pains for his 



196 THE DREAMER 

benefit he would undoubtedly be disappointed — seri- 
ously disappointed — if his plan should fail. Mr. Ken- 
nedy had been so kind, so generous — doubtless he 
would gladly advance him a sum sufficient to make 
himself presentable for the dinner — to be paid by the 
first check received as a result of the meeting. A very 
modest sum would do. He might manage it, he 
thought, with twenty dollars. 

Finally, he drew his unfinished note before him again 
and added to what he had written, 

" If you will be my friend so far as to loan me 
twenty dollars, I will be with you tomorrow — other- 
wise it will be impossible, and I must submit to my 
fate. Sincerely yours, 

E. A. PoE." 



THE DREAMER 197 



CHAPTER XX. 



The dinner went off charmingly. In addition to 
several journalists, Mr. Latrobe and Mr. Miller who, 
with Mr. Kennedy, had formed the committee that 
awarded the prize to Edgar Poe, were there and the 
meeting between the young guest of honor and his 
patrons engendered a spirit of hon-homie that was 
palpable to all. Under its spell The Dreamer's 
spirits rose. Yet he was quiet, listening with deep 
attention to the conversation of his elders, but having 
little to say, until the repast was half over, when he 
responded to the evident desire of his host to draw him 
out. The conversation had turned upon a favorite 
theme of his — the power of words. He threw him- 
self into it with zest, and with brilliant play of ex- 
pression animating his splendid eyes and pale features, 
and the graceful, unrestrained gestures of one thor- 
oughly at ease and entirely unconscious of self, he 
held the table spell-bound with a flow of sparkling 
talk in which his own exquisite choice of words de- 
lighted his hearers no less than the originality and 
beauty of his thought. 

In the young editor of The Saturday Visitor he 
promptly found a second friend among men of letters. 
Mr. Wilmer, already prejudiced in his favor by the 
success of the " MS. Found in a Bottle," and its cor- 
dial reception by the public, and by Mr. Kennedy's 
warm words of recommendation, yielded at once to 
the witchery of the poetic eyes, the courtly manners 
and the charmed tongue, and not only befriended him 
by inviting and accepting his writings for publication. 



198 TH E DREAMER 

but gave him, as time went on, what proved to be a 
stimulant to good work as well as one of his greatest 
pleasures — the intimate companionship of a man of 
congenial tastes and near his own age. 

The winter that followed was one of the happiest 
of The Dreamer^s life — a lull in a tempest, a dream 
of peace within a dream of storm and stress. 

He was soon able to return the twenty dollars to 
Mr. Kennedy. The newspapers kept him busy and 
while the returns were — so far — small, he was hope- 
ful. He felt that he had made a beginning, and that 
the future promised well. His work was praised and 
he became something of a lion — the doors of many a 
proud Baltimore home opening graciously to his touch. 

He cared little for general society, however. His 
greatest pleasure he found in his evenings with the 
Kennedys (for Mrs. Kennedy had taken him in as 
promptly as her husband) or in a canter far into the 
country on the saddle horse which Mr. Kennedy, not- 
ing his pallor and thinking that out-door exercise 
would be of benefit to him, kindly placed at his dis- 
posal, or in walks in the fields and lanes beyond the 
city with his new chum Wilmer. Many a fine after- 
noon saw these two cronies, often accompanied by 
the sprite, Virginia, with her airy movements and 
vivid beauty, rambling in the suburbs, and beyond, 
with heads close in intimate communion of thought 
and fancy. 

What he enjoyed most of all was the time spent at 
his desk, in the shelter of the new-found haven of rest, 
with the happy " Muddie " and " Sissy " nearby. 

This little family circle was unique. There was an 
unmistakably oak-like element in the nature of the 



TEE DREAMER 199 

widow which was apparent to some degree even in her 
outward appearance, in the stateliness and dignity of 
her figure and carriage — an element of sturdiness and 
self-reliance which made it her pleasure to be clung 
to, looked up to, leaned upon. The character of her 
new-found son was, on the contrary, vine-like. He 
was constantly reaching out tendrils of craving for 
love, for appreciation, for understanding. More — 
for advice, for guidance. Such tendrils seeking 
a foot-hold, make a strong appeal to every womanly 
woman. She sees in them a call to her nobility 
of soul, to the mother that is a part of her 
spiritual nature — a call that gives her pleasant good- 
angel sensations, that soften her heart and flatter her 
self-esteem. To the Widow Clemm, with her self- 
reliance and her highly developed maternal instinct, 
the appeal was irresistible and between her and The 
Dreamer the ivy and oak relation was promptly estab- 
lished, while in the little Virginia he found a hearts- 
ease blossom to be loved and sheltered by both — the 
loveliest of heartsease blossoms whose beauty, whose 
purity and innocence and the stored sweets of whose 
nature were all for him. 

The three lived, indeed, for each other only, in a 
dream-valley apart from and invisible to, the rest of 
the world, for their dreams of which it was constructed 
made it theirs and theirs alone. Their dreams piled 
beautiful mountains around the valley through which 
peace flowed as a gentle river, while love and content- 
ment and innocent pleasures were as flowers besprinkl- 
ing the grass and speaking to their hearts of the love 
and the glory of God, and the fancies with which they 
beguiled the time were as tall, fantastic trees, moved 
by soft zephyrs. And because of the bright flowers 



200 THE DREAMER 

ever springing in the green turf that carpeted the 
valley, they named it the Valley of the Many-Colored 
Grass. And to the three the dream-valley, with its 
peace and its beauty and its sweet seclusion, was the 
real worlds while all the wilderness outside of it, where 
other men dwelt was the unreal. 

One happy effect of these peaceful days upon The 
Dreamer was that there was in them no temptation to 
excess — no restless craving for excitement. The Bo- 
hemian — the Edgar Goodfellow — side of him found, 
it is true, an outlet, but a harmless one. He found 
it in the genial atmosphere of the Widow Meagher's 
modest eatingj-house where he and his new crony, 
Wilmer, passed many a jolly hour. The widow, an 
elderly, portly dame, with a kind Irish heart and keen 
Irish wit, had the power of diffusing a wonderful 
cheerfulness around her. Her shop was clean, if plain, 
her oysters were savory, if cheap. Like all women, 
she petted Edgar Poe, and hearing from Wilmer that 
he was a poet, she at once gave him the name by 
which the West Point boys had called him, and to all 
of the frequenters of her shop he was known as "the 
Bard.'' 

Her shop had not only an oyster counter, but a bar 
and a room for cards and smoking but these had little 
attraction for Poe at this period of his career — much 
to the widow's dissatisfaction, for she wished "the 
Bard" to be merry, and did not like to see him 
neglect what she honestly and unblushingly believed 
to be the really good things of life. But though to 
her pressing invitations, "Bard take a hand," "Bard 
take a nip," he was generally deaf, he was more accomo- 
dating when, after getting off an unusually clever bit 



THE DREAMER 201 

of pleasantry (putting her customers into an uproar of 
laughter) she would turn to him with, " Bard put it in 
poethry." And put it ''in poethry '^ he did— to the 
increased hilarity of the crowd. 

The month of February brought an interruption to 
tlie smooth and pleasant course of The Dreamer's life. 
A long time had passed since he had heard anything 
of his friends down in Virginia, and it was there- 
fore with quick interest that he broke the seal of 
a letter bearing the Richmond post-mark and ad- 
dressed to him in the unforgotten hand of his early 
admirer, Eob Sully. Dear old Rob, the sight of the 
familiar hand-writing alone warmed The Dreamer's 
heart and brought the soft, melting expression to his 
eyes! 

The object of the letter was to tell him that Mr. 
Allan was extremely ill — dying, some thought, though 
the end might not be immediate. Rob was taking it 
upon himself to write because he felt that Eddie ought 
to know. Mr. Allan had lately been heard to speak 
kindly of Eddie, he had been told, and it had occurred 
to him that Eddie might like to come on and have a 
word of forgiveness from him before he died. 

As ''Eddie" read, the pleasure the first sight of 
the letter had given him turned to sudden, sharp 
pain. Mr. Allan 2Jidi— death ! He had never thought 
of associating the two. Under the influence of the 
shock his heart became all tenderness and regret. 

He hurriedly packed his carpet-bag, kissed Mrs. 
Clemm and Virginia goodbye, and set out post-haste 
for Richmond and the homestead on Main and Eifth 
Streets. 

He did not stop to lift the brass knocker this time. 



202 THE DREAMER 

The forlorn details of his last visit, his lack of right 
to cross that threshold uninvited — what mattered such 
considerations now? They were, indeed, forgotten. 
Everything was forgotten — everything save that the 
man who had stood in the position of father to him 
was dying — dying without a word of pardon to him, 
the most wayward (he felt at that moment of severe 
contrition) — tJie most wayward of prodigal sons. 
Everything was forgotten save that he was having a 
race with death — a race for a father's blessing ! 

He flung wide the massive front door and hastened 
through the spacious hall, up the stair and into the 
room where the ill man sat in an arm-chair. On the 
threshold he paused for a moment. Mr. Allan saw 
and recognized him, and at once the misunderstand- 
ing of the actions of his adopted son for which he 
seemed to have a gift, asserted itself, construing the 
visit as an unpardonable liberty. The only motive 
Mr. Allan could imagine which could have prompted 
Edgar Poe to force himself, as it seemed to him, into 
his presence at this time was a mercenary one, and 
burning with indignation, his eyes gleaming with some- 
thing like their old fire, he half raised himself from 
the chair. 

" How dare you ? '' he screamed in the grating tones 
of angry old age. Then, grasping the cane at his side 
in trembling fingers and raising it with threatening 
gesture, he ordered his visitor to leave the room at 
once. 

Edgar Poe stood aghast for a moment, then fled 
down the stair and out of the door and turning his 
back for the last time upon the house whose young 
master he had been, with the word ^^ Nevermore" 
ringing like a knell in his ears, made his way again 



THE DREAMER 203 

to the abode of love and peace in Baltimore, which 
held his whole heart and which had become his home. 
A few weeks later Mr. Allan died, leaving the whole 
of his fortune to his second wife and her children. 

It now became more important than ever for Edgar 
Poe to earn a living. In spite of the fact that Mr. 
Allan was known to have lost all regard for him, his 
friends had alwaj^s believed that he would be remem- 
bered in the will. They believed that John Allan's 
rigid, sometimes even strained, idea of justice would 
cause him to provide for the boy for whom he had 
voluntarily, albeit against his own Judgment, made 
himself responsible. The fact that the boy had turned 
out to be, in Mr. Allan's opinion, "trifling," that he 
refused to engage in any "useful" work and that at 
five and twenty years of age he had not established 
himself in any " paying business "' would, those who 
knew Mr. Allan best believed, be with him but another 
reason for ensuring against want his first wife's spoiled 
darling who was evidently incapable of taking care of 
himself and therefore (so they believed he would 
argue) so much the more his care. 

Possibly The Dreamer may have taken this view 
himself. However that may be, the opening of the 
will silenced all conjecture, and as has been said, made 
the need of his making his work produce money more 
pressing than ever. His friend Wilmer did his best 
for him — publishing his stories in The Saturday Visi- 
tor from time to time and paying him as well as he 
was able. But "Wilmer and his paper were poor them- 
selves. The Visitor was only a small weekly, with a 
modest subscription list. It had little to pay, how- 
ever good the "copy" and that little and Mother 



204 THE DREAMER 

Clemm's earnings put together barely kept the wolf 
from the door. 

Wlien the frequent and welcome summons to the 
bountiful board of the Kennedys came the young poet 
blushed for shame in the pleasure he could not help 
feeling in anticipation of the chance to satisfy his 
chastened appetite, and he often found himself fear- 
ing that the hunger with which he ate the good things 
which these kind friends placed upon his plate would 
betray the necessary frugality of the dear " Muddle's " 
house-keeping, which was one of the sacred secrets of 
the sweet home. Sometimes his pride would make 
him go so far as to decline delicious morsels in the 
hope of correcting such an impression, if it should 
exist. 

He racked his brain to iind a means of making his 
work bring him more money. Upon Mr. Kennedy's 
advice, he sent his " Tales of the Folio Club " to the 
Philadelphia publishing house of " Carey and Lea." 
After several weeks of anxious waiting he received a 
letter accepting the collection for publication but 
frankly admitting that his receiving any profit from 
the sale of the book was an exceedingly doubtful mat- 
ter. They suggested, however, that they be permitted 
to sell some of the tales to publishers of the then popu- 
lar "annuals," reserving the right to reprint them in 
the book. To this the author gladly consented and 
received with a joy that was pathetic the sum of fifteen 
dollars from " The Souvenir," which had purchased 
one of the tales at a dollar a printed page. 

He and Wilmer put their heads together in dreams 
of literary work by which a man could live. One of 
these dreams took form in the prospectus of a purely 
literary journal of the highest class which was to be 



TEE DREAMER 205 

in its criticisms and editorial opinions ^^ fearless, in- 
dependent and sternly just." 

But the scheme required capital and never got be- 
yond the glowing prospectus. 

In spite of the small sums that came to him as 
veritable God-sends from the sale of his stories and 
from odd jobs on the Visitor and other journals, Edgar 
Poe was poor — miserably poor. And just as he had 
begun to flatter himself that he did not mind, that 
he would bear it with the nonchalance of the true 
philosopher he believed he had become, it assumed 
the shape of horror unspeakable to him. Not for him- 
self, if there were only himself to think of, he felt 
assured, he could laugh poverty — want even — to scorn ; 
but that his little Virginia should feel the pinch was 
damnable ! 

Two years had made marked changes in Virginia. 
She was losing the formless plumpness of childhood 
and growing rapidly into a slight and graceful maid- 
en — a " rare and radiant maiden/' with the tender 
light of womanhood beginning to dawn in her velvet 
eyes and to sweeten the curves of her lips. A maiden 
lovelier by far than the child had been but with the 
same divine purity and innocence that had always 
been hers — that were his, for her beauty, her purity 
and innocence and the stored sweets of her nature 
were still for him alone and for him alone too, was 
her sweet companionship — her comradeship — of which 
he never wearied. 

Under his guidance her mind had unfolded like a 
flower. She was beginning to speak fluently in French 
and in Italian. How he loved the musical southern 
accents on her tongue ! And she was developing an 
exquisite singing voice. Her voice was her crowning 



206 THE DREAMER 

graces — her voice was his delight of delights ! As he 
gazed into the shadows that lay under her long black 
lashes and listened to her voice, with its hint of hidden 
springs of passion, his pulses stirred at the thought 
that this lovely flower of dawning womanhood was 
his little Virginia, and his own heart ached to think 
that any desire of hers should ever be denied. 

In his desperation he thought of teaching and ap- 
plied for a position in a school, but without success. 

But relief was at hand. 

While the Dreamer and his friend the editor of The 
Saturday Visitor had been building literary air-castles 
in Baltimore, a journal destined to take something 
approaching such a stand as their ideal was actually 
founded, in Eichmond, under the title of The Southern 
Literary Messenger. Its owner and publisher, Mr. 
Thomas W. White, Avas no dreamer, but a practical 
printer and an enterprising man of business. Early 
in this year — the year 1835 — Mr. White wrote to 
Mr. Kennedy, requesting a contribution from his pen 
for the new magazine, and, as was to be expected, Mr. 
Kennedy, with his wonted thoughtfulness of his lite- 
rary protege, wrote back commending to Mr. White's 
notice the work of " a remarkable young man by the 
name of Edgar Poe." 

At Mr. Kennedy's suggestion Edgar bundled off 
some of the " Tales of the Folio Club " for Mr. White's 
inspection, with the result that in the March number 
of the Messenger the weird story "Berenice," ap- 
peared. It and its author became at once the talk of 
the hour, and when the history of " The Adventures 
of Hans Phaal " came out in the June number it 
found the reading public ready and waiting to fall 
upon and devour it. 



TEE DREAMER 307 

Other stories and articles followed in quick succes- 
sion and the pungent critiques and reviews of the new 
pen were looked for and read with as great interest as 
the tales. 

In a glow over the prosperity which the popularity 
of the new writer was bringing his magazine, Mr. 
White wrote to him offering him the position of assist- 
ant editor, with a salary of five hundred and twenty 
dollars a year, to begin with. Of course the offer was 
to be accepted! The salary, small at it was, seemed 
to The Dreamer in comparison to the diminutive and 
irregular sums he had been accustomed to receive, 
almost like wealth. But its acceptance would mean, 
for the present, anyhow, separation — a break In the 
small home circle where had been, with all of its 
deprivations, so much of joy — a dissolving of the 
magical Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. Not for 
a moment, he vowed to Mother Clemm and Virginia, 
was this separation to be looked upon as permanent. 
Just so soon as he should be able to provide a home 
for them in Eichmond he would have them with him 
again, and there they would reconstruct their dream- 
valley. But for the present — . 

The present, in spite of the new prosperity, was un- 
bearable ! 

In vain the Mother with the patience born of her 
superior years and experience, assured them that time 
had wings, and that the days of absence would be 
quickly past. To the youthful poet and the little 
maid who lived with no other thought than to love 
and be loved by him a months- a week — a day apart, 
seemed an eternity. 

In the midst of their woe at the prospect a miracle 
happened — a miracle and a discovery. 



208 THE DREAM ER 

It fell upon a serene summer's afternoon when the 
two children- — they were both that at heart — wandered 
along a sweet, shady lane leading from the out-skirts 
of town into the country. It was to be their last walk 
together for who knew, who could tell how long? 
The poet's great grey eyes wore their deepest melan- 
choly and the little maid's soft brown ones too, were 
full of trouble, for had not their love turned to pain? 
They spoke little, for the love and the pain were alike 
too deep for words, but the heart of each was filled 
with , broodings and musings upon the love it bore the 
other and upon the agony of parting. 

How could he leave her? the poet asked himself. 
His cherished comrade whose beauty, whose purity 
and innocence, the stored sweets of whose nature were 
for him alone? Into his life of loneliness, of loveless- 
ness, of despair — a life from which everyone who had 
really cared for him had been snatched by untimely 
death and shut away from him forever in an early 
grave — a life where there had been not only sorrow, 
but bitterness — where there had been pain and want 
and homelessness and desolate wanderings and long- 
ings for the unattainable — where there had been mis- 
understanding and distrust and temptation and de- 
feat — into such a life this wee bit of maidenhood — 
this true heartsease — had crept and blossomed, filling 
heart and life with beauty and hope and love^ — with 
blessed healing. 

How could he leave her? To others she seemed 
wrapped in timid reserve. He only had the key to 
the fair realm of her unfolding mind. How could he 
bear to leave her for even a little while? How barren 
his life would be without her ! How shorn of all beauty 
and grace! 



TEE DREAMER 209 

And what would her life be without him, to whom 
had been offered up all her beauty and the stored sweets 
of her nature? Who would guard her from other 
eyes, that as her beauty and charm came to their full 
bloom might look covetously upon her? 

For the first time (and the bare suggestion seemed 
profanation) it occured to him that a day might come 
when, as this slip of maidenhood walked forth in her 
surpassing beauty and her precious innocence and 
purity the eyes of a man might make note of her love- 
liness, her altogether desirableness — might rest upon 
her with hopes of possession — and he not there to kill 
him upon the spot. ^Tiat if in his absence another's 
hand should be stretched to pluck his heartsease blos- 
som — that left unguarded, unprotected by him, an- 
other should snatch it, in its beauty, its purity and 
innocence, to his bosom? 

The thought was hell ! 

Faint and trembling, he gazed down upon her as 
they strolled along, compelling her soft eyes to meet 
his anguished ones. His face was white and strained 
with his misery. She was pale and trembling, too, 
and there was dew on the sweeping lashes, and as 
she lifted them and looked into his face she trembled 
more. He looked upon her, tenderly marvelling to 
see in her at once the loveliest of children and of 
women — a woman with her first grief ! 

There was heart-break in his voice, for himself and 
for her, as he murmured (brokenly) words of love 
and of comfort in her ear, and in her voice as she, 
brokenly, answered him. 

The sun was setting — a pageant in which they both 
were wont to take exquisite delight — but they could 
not look at the glowing heavens for the heaven of 



210 THE DREAMER 

love and of beautiful sorrow that each found in the 
eyes of the other. 

Suddenly, they knew! 

The knowledge burst upon them like an illumining 
flood. How or whence it came they could not tell, 
nor did they question — but they knew that the love 
they bore each other was no brother and sister love, 
but that what time they had been calling each other 
*^ Buddie," and ^^ Sissy/^ there had been growing — 
growing in their hearts the red, red rose of romance — 
the love betwixt man and maid of which poets tell — 
knew that in that sweet, that sad, that wondrous even- 
tide the rose had burst into glorious flower. 

They trembled in the presence of this sweetest 
miracle. The beauty and solemnity of it well nigh 
deprived them of the power of speech. A divine 
silence fell upon them and they slowly, softly took 
their way homeward through the gathering dusk, hand 
in hand — but with few words — to tell the Mother. 

To the widow their disclosure came as a shock. At 
first she thought the silly pair must be joking — then 
that they were mad. Finally she realized their earnest- 
ness and their happiness and saw that the situation 
was serious and must be dealt with with the utmost 
tact. Still, she could hardly believe what she saw 
and heard. Was it possible that the demure girl talk- 
ing to her so seriously of love and marriage was her 
little Virginia — her baby ? And that these two should 
have thought of such a thing ! Cousins ! — Brother 
and sister, almost! — And with such disparity in ages 
— thirteen and six-and-twenty ! 

She had lived long enough, however, to know that 
love is governed by no rules or regulations and be- 
sides, she had kept through all the changes and chances 



THE DREAMER 211 

of lier checkered life, a belief in true love as fresh as a 
girl's. This was too sacred a thing to be carelessly 
handled — only, it was not what she would have 
chosen. . . . Yet — was it not? 

A new thought came to her — a revelation — inspira- 
tion — what you will, and sunk her in deep revery. 

Why was this not what she would have chosen ? Why 
not a union between her children — her all? Her own 
days were fast running out. She could not live and 
make a home for them always — then, what would 
become of them ? She would die happy, when her time 
came, if she could see them in their own home, bound 
by the most sacred, the most indissoluble of ties^— 
bound together until death should part them! 

She fell asleep with a heart full of thankfulness to 
God for his mercies. 

A quite different view of the matter was taken by 
other members of the Poe connection in Baltimore — 
particularly the men, who positively refused to regard 
the love affair as anything more than sentimental non- 
sense — " moonshine " — they called it, which would be 
as fleeting as it was foolish. Their cousin. Judge 
Neilson Poe, who had made a pet of Virginia, was 
especially active in his opposition and brought every 
argument he could think of to bear upon the young 
lovers and upon Mrs. Clemm in his endeavor to induce 
them to break the engagement; but he only succeeded 
in sending Virginia flying with frightened face to 
^'^ Buddie's '^ arms, vowing (as, much to Cousin Neil- 
son's disgust, she hung upon his neck) that she would 
never give him up, while " Buddie," holding her close, 
assured her, in the story-book language that they both 
loved, that "all the king's horses and all the king's 
men" would not be strong enough to take her from 
him. 



213 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTEE XXI. 

Midsummer found Edgar Poe in Richmond and 
regularly at work upon his new duties in the office of 
The Southern Literary Messenger. He felt that if he 
had not actually reached the end of the rainbow^, it 
was at least in sight and it rested upon the place of 
all others most gratifying to him — the dear city of 
his boyhood whose esteem he so ardently desired. 
Most soothing to his pride, he found it, after his seve- 
ral ignominious retreats, to return in triumph, a suc- 
cessful author, called to a place of acknowledged dis- 
tinction, for all its meagre income. 

The playmates of his youth — now substantial citi- 
zens of the little capital — called promptly upon him at 
his boarding-house. They were glad to have him back 
and they showed it; glad of his success and glad and 
proud to find their early faith in his powers justified, 
their early astuteness proven. 

All Richmond, indeed, received him with open arms 
and if there were some few persons who could not for- 
get his wild-oats at the University and his seeming 
ingratitude to Mr. Allan, who they declared had been 
the kindest and most indulgent of fathers to him, and 
who did not invite him to their homes or accept invi- 
tations to parties given in his honor, they were the 
losers — he had friends and to spare. 

Yet he was not happy. The ivy had been torn from 
the oak and there was no sweet heartsease blossom to 
make glad his road — to made daily — hourly — offer- 
ings to him and him alone of the beauty, physical and 
spiritual, that his soul worshipped — of beauty and of 



THE DREAMER 213 

unquestioning love and sympathy and approbation. In 
other words. The Dreamer was sick, miserably sick, with 
the disease of longing; longing for the modest home 
and the invigorating presence of the Mother; long- 
ing that was exquisite pain for the sight, the sound, 
the touch, the daily companionship of the child who 
without losing one whit of the purity, the innocence, 
the charm of childhood, had so suddenly, so sweetly 
become a woman — a woman embodying all of his 
dreams — a woman who lived with no other thought 
than to love and be loved by him. 

Life, no matter what else it might give, life without 
the soft glance of her eye, the sweet sound of her 
voice, the pure touch of her hand within his hand, her 
lips upon his lips, was become an empty, aching void. 

After two years of the sheltered fireside in Balti- 
more whose seclusion had made the dream of the Val- 
ley of the Many-Colored Grass possible, the boarding- 
house with its hideous clatter, its gossip and its com- 
monplaceness was the merest make-shift of a home. 
It was stifling. How was a dreamer to breathe in a 
boarding-house? He was even homesick for the purr 
and the comfortable airs of the old white cat ! 

Whenever he could he turned his back upon the 
boarding-house and tried to forget it, but the clatter 
and the gossip seemed to follow him, their din linger- 
ing in his ears as he paced the streets in a fever of 
disgust and longing. For the first time since Edgar 
Poe had opened his eyes upon the tasteful homelike- 
ness of the widow Clemm's chamber and the tender, 
dark eyes of Virginia searching his face with soft won- 
der, the old restlessness and dissatisfaction with life 
and the whole scheme of things were upon him — the 
blue devils which he believed had been exorcised for- 



214 THE DREAMER 

ever had liim in their chitches. Whither should he fly 
from their harrassments ? By what road should he 
escape ? 

At the answer — the only answer vouchsafed him — 
he stood aghast. 

" ISTo, no ! " he cried within him, " Not that — not 
that ! " Seeking to deafen his ears to a voice that at 
once charmed and terrified him, for it was the voice 
of a demon which possessed the allurements of an 
angel — a demon he reckoned he had long ago fast 
bound in chains from which it would never have the 
strength to arise. It was the voice that dwelt in the 
cup — the single cup — so innocent seeming, so really 
innocent for many, yet so ruinous for him; for, with 
all its promises of cheer and comfort it led — and he 
knew it — to disaster. 

Bitterly he fought to drown the sounds of the voice, 
but the more he deafened his ears the more insistent, 
the clearer, the more alluring its tones became. 

And it followed him everywhere. At every board 
where he was a guest the brimming cup stood beside 
his plate, at every turn of the street he was button- 
holed by some friend old or new, with the invitation 
to join him in the " cup of kindness." At every 
evening party he found himself surrounded by bevies 
of charming young Hebes, who, as innocent as angels 
of any intention of doing him a wrong, implored him 
to propose them a toast. 

How could he refuse them? Especially when 
acquiescence meant escape from this horrible, horrible 
soul-sickness, this weight that was bearing his spirits 
down — crushing them. 

Therein lay the tempter's power. Kot in appetite — 
he was no swine to swill for love of the draught. When 



THE DREAMER 215 

he did yield he drained the cup scarce tasting its con^ 
tents. But ah^ the freedom from the sickness that 
tortured him, the weight that oppressed him! And 
ah, the exhilaration, physical and mental, the delight- 
ful exhilaration which put melancholy to flight, loosed 
his tongue and started the machinery of his brain — 
which robbed the past of regret and made the present 
and the future rosy! 

It was in the promise of this exhilaration that the 
seductiveness of the dreaded tones lay. 

Even his kindly old physician, diagnosing the pallor 
of his cheeks and melancholy in his eyes as " a touch 
of malaria,^^ added a note of insistence to the voice, as 
he prescribed that panacea of the day, " a mint julep 
before breakfast." 

Yet he still sternly and stoutly turned a deaf ear to 
the voice of the charmer, while dejection drew him 
deeper and deeper into its depths until one day he 
found he could not write. His pen seemed suddenly 
to have lost its power. He sat at his desk in the office 
of the Messenger with paper before him, with pens 
and ink at hand, but his brain refused to produce an, 
idea, and for such vague half-thoughts as came to him, 
he could find no words to give expression. 

He was seized upon by terror. 

Had his gift of the gods deserted him ? Better death 
than life without his gift! Without it the very 
ground under his feet seemed uncertain and unsafe! 

Then he fell. Driven to the wall, as it seemed to 
him, he took the only road he saw that led, or seemed 
to lead, to deliverance. He yielded his will to the 
voice of the tempter, he tasted the freedom, the exhila- 
ration, the wild joy that his imagination had pictured — 
drank deep of it! 



216 THE DREAMER 

And then he paid the price he had known all along 
he would have to pay, though in the hour of his sever- 
est temptation the knowledge had not had power to 
make him strong. Neither, in that hour, had he been 
able to foresee how hard the price would be. That 
shadowy, yet very real other self, his avenging con- 
science, in whose approval he had so long happily 
rested, arose in its wrath and rebuked him as he had 
never been rebuked before. It scourged him. It held 
up before him his bright prospects, his lately acquired 
and enviable social position, assuring him as it held 
them up, of their insecurity. It pointed with warning 
finger to the end of the rainbow and the road leading 
to it seemed to have suddenly grown ten times longer 
and rougher than before. 

Finally it held up the images of his two good angels, 
" Muddie,^^ with her heart of oak, and her tender, sor- 
row-stricken face, and Virginia, whose soft eyes were 
a heaven of trustful love — whose beauty, whose purity 
and innocence, the stored sweets of whose nature were 
for him alone, and to whom he was as faultless, as su- 
preme as the sun in heaven. 

It was too much. The dejection into which his 
^^ blue devils " had cast him was as nothing to the 
remorse that overwhelmed him now. On his knees 
before Heaven he confessed that his last estate was 
worse than his first, and cried aloud for forgiveness 
for the past and strength for the future. 

In this mood he sat down to write to Mr. Kennedy 
(who had been absent upon a summer vacation when 
he left Baltimore) a letter of acknowledgment for his 
benefactions — for whatever The Dreamer was, it is 
very certain that he was not ungrateful. 



THE DREAMER 217 

The date he placed at the top of his page was " Sep- 
tember 11, 1835/' 

"I received a letter yesterday," he wrote, "which 
tells me you are back in town. I hasten therefore, to 
write you and express by letter what I have always 
found it impossible to express orally — my deep sense 
of gratitude for your frequent and effectual assistance 
and kindness. 

" Through your influence Mr. White has been in- 
duced to employ me in assisting him with the editorial 
duties of his Magazine — at a salary of $520 per an- 
num." 

He had not intended to mention his troubles to Mr. 
Kennedy, but with each word he wrote the impulse 
to unburden himself which he always felt when talk- 
ing to this kind, sympathetic man, grew stronger and 
he found his pen almost automatically taking an un- 
expected turn. It was out of the abundance of his 
anguished heart that he added: 

" The situation is agreeable to me for many reasons — 
but alas! it appears that nothing can now give me 
pleasure — or the slightest gratification. Excuse me, 
my Dear Sir, if in this letter you find much inco- 
herency. My feelings at this moment are pitiable 
indeed. You will believe me when I say that I am 
still miserable in spite of the great improvement in 
my circumstances; for a man who is writing for effect 
does not write thus. My heart is open before you — 
if it be worth reading, read it. I am wretched and 
know not why. Console me — for you can. Convince 
me that it is worth one's while to live. Persuade me 
to do what is right. You will not fail to see that I am 
suffering from a depression of spirits which will ruin 
me if it be lonar continued. Write me then, and 



218 TEE DREAMER 

quickly. Urge me to do what is right. Your words 
will have more weight with me than the words of 
others — for you were my friend when no one else 
was." 

Some men of more goodness than wisdom might 
have read this letter with impatience — perhaps dis- 
gust^ and tossed it into the waste basket, not deeming 
it worth an answer, or pigeon-holed it to be answered 
in a more convenient season — which would probably 
never have arrived. It is easy to imagine the con- 
tempt with which John Allan would have perused it. 
Not so John Kennedy. Busy lawyer and successful 
man of letters and of the world though he was, he 
had gone out of his way to stretch a hand to the gifted 
starveling he had discovered struggling for a foothold 
on the bottomost rung of the ladder of literary fame, 
and had not only helped him up the ladder but had 
drawn him, in his weakness and his strength, into the 
circle of his friendship, and now he had no idea of let- 
ting him go. Mr. Kennedy was a great lawyer with a 
great tenderness for human nature, born of a great 
knowledge of it. He did not expect young men — even 
talented ones — to be faultless or to be fountains of 
sound sense, or even always to be strong of will. Wlien 
he received Edgar Poe's wail he had just returned to 
his office after a long vacation and found himself over 
head and ears in work; but he responded at once. If 
it had seemed to him a foolish letter he did not say 
so. If it had shocked or disappointed him, he did not 
say so. He wrote in the kindly tolerant and under- 
standing tone he always took with his protege a letter 
wholesome and bracing as a breath from the salt sea. 

" My dear Poe/^ he began, in his simple familiar 
way, " I am sorry to see you in such plight as your 



THE DREAMER 219 

letter shows you in. It is strange that just at the 
time when everybody is praising you and when For- 
tune has begun to smile upon your hitherto wretched 
circumstances you should be invaded by these villian- 
ous blue devils. It belongs however, to your age and 
temper to be thus buffeted — but be assured it only 
wants a little resolution to master the adversary for- 
ever. Else early, live generously, and make cheerful 
acquaintances and I have no doubt you will send these 
misgivings of the heart all to the Devil. You will 
doubtless do well henceforth in literature and add to 
your comforts as well as your reputation which it 
gives me great pleasure to tell you is everywhere rising 
in popular esteem." 

This and more he wrote, in kind, encouraging vein, 
and closed his letter with a friendly invitation : 

" Write to me frequently, and believe me very truly 
Yours, 

John P. Kennedy/' 

The same post that brought Mr. Kennedy's letter 
brought The Dreamer other mail from Baltimore — 
brought him letters from both Virginia and Mother 
Clemm. 

They had an especial reason for writing, each said. 
They had news for him — news which was most dis- 
turbing to them and they feared it would be to him. 

Disturbing indeed, was the news the letters brought. 
It drove him into a rage and aroused him into action 
v/hich made him forget all of his late troubles. 

Their Cousin N'eilson and his wife, they wrote him, 
had not ceased to bring every argument they could 
think of to bear upon Virginia to induce her to break 
her engagement and had finally proposed that they 



220 THE DREAMER 

should take her into their home, treat her as an own 
daughter or young sister, providing for her all things 
needful and desirable for a young girl of her station, 
until her eighteenth birthday, after which if she and 
Edgar had not changed their minds, they could be 
married. 

He dashed off and posted answers to the letters at 
once, making violent protest against a scheme that 
seemed to him positively iniquitous and pleading with 
" Muddie " to keep Virginia for him. But writing was 
not enough. He determined to answer in person. 

A day or two later Virginia and her mother were 
in the act of discussing his letters, which had just 
come, when the sitting-room door quietly opened, and 
there stood the man who was all the world to them ! 

Virginia, with a scream of delight, was in his arms in 
a flash and began telling him, breathlessly, what a fright 
she had been in for fear " Cousin Neilson '^ would take 
her away and she would never see him again. 

With a rising tide of tenderness for her and rage 
against their cousin, he kissed the trouble from her 
eyes. 

'^ Don't be afraid, sweetheart," he murmured, " He 
shall never take you from me. I have come back to 
marry you ! " 

" To marry her ? " exclaimed Mrs. Clemm. " At 
once, do you mean ? " 

" At once ! Today or tomorrow — for I must be get- 
ting back to Eichmond as soon as possible. Don't you 
see, Muddie, that this is just a plot of Neilson's to sepa- 
rate us? He never cared for me — he loves Virginia 
and is determined I shall not have her. But we'll out- 
wit him ! We'll be married at once. We'll have to 



THE DREAMER 221 

keep it secret at first-^ -until I am able to provide a 
home for my little wife and our dear mother in Rich- 
mond, but I will go away with peace of mind and leave 
her in peace of mind, for once she is mine only death 
can come between us. We will keep it secret dear, he 
added, with his lips on the dusky hair of the little 
maid who was still held fast in his arms. "We will 
keep it secret, but if Neilson Poe becomes troublesome 
you will only have to show him your marriage certifi- 
cate." 

Virginia joyfully agreed to this plan, while the widow, 
finding opposition useless, finally consented too — and 
the impetuous lover was off post-haste for a license. 

It was a unique little wedding which took place next 
day in Christ Church, when a beautiful, dreamy look- 
ing youth, with intellectual brow and classic profile and 
a beautiful, dreamy-looking maid, half his age, plighted 
their troth. The only attendant was Mother Clemm in 
her habitual plain black dress and widow^s cap, with 
floating cap-strings, sheer and snowy white. No music, 
no flowers, no witnesses even, save the widowed mother 
and the aged sexton who was bound over to strict secrecy. 

But in the dim, still, empty church the beautiful words 
of the old, old rite seemed to this strange pair of lov- 
ers to take on new solemnity as they fell from the lips 
of the white robed priest and sank deep into their young 
hearts, filling and thrilling them with fresh hope and 
faith and love and high resolve. 



333 THE DEE AM ER 



CHAPTEE XXII. 

In the following spring Edgar Poe and Virginia 
Clemm were^ strange as it may seem^ principals in 
another wedding. The months intervening between 
the two ceremonies had been teeming with interest to 
them both — filled with work and with happiness just 
short of that perfect satisfaction — that completeness — 
that unattainable which it is part of being a mortal 
with an immortal mind and soul to be continually 
striving after, and missing, and will be until the half- 
light of this world is merged into the light ineffable 
of the one to come. 

The Dreamer had returned from his brief visit to 
Baltimore a new man. The blue devils were gone. 
The heart and mind which they had made their dwell- 
ing-place were swept clean of every vestige of them and 
were filled to overflowing with a sweet and rare pres- 
ence — the presence of her who lived with no other 
thought than to love and be loved by him; for he felt 
that her spirit was with him at every moment of the 
day, though her fair body was other whither. The 
consciousness of the secret he carried in his heart 
flooded his nature with sunshine. Because of it he 
carried his head more proudly — wore a new dignity 
which his friends attributed entirely to the success of 
his work upon the magazine. He was filled with peace 
and good will to all the world. He was happy and 
wanted everybody else to be happy — it was apparent 
in himself and in his work. In his dreamy moods his 
fancy spread a broader, a stronger wing, and soared 



THE DREAMER 223 

with new daring to heights unexplored before. When 
Edgar Goodfellow was in the ascendency he threw him- 
self with unwonted zest into the pleasures that were 
" like poppies spread " in the way of the successful 
author and editor — the literary lion of the town. 

He had always been an enthusiastic and graceful 
dancer and now nothing else seemed to give him so 
natural a vent for the happiness that was beating in 
his veins. His feet seemed like his pen, to be inspired. 
He felt that he could dance till Doomsday and all the 
prettiest, most bewitching girls let him see how pleased 
they were to have him for a partner. In the brief, 
glowing rests between the dances he rewarded them 
with charming talk, and verses in praise of their love- 
liness which seemed to fall without the slightest effort 
from his tongue into their pretty, delighted ears or 
from his pencil into their albums. 

There was at least one fair damsel — a slight, wil- 
lowy creature with violet eyes and flaxen ringlets, who 
treasured the graceful lines he dedicated to her with a 
feeling warmer than friendship. She was pretty Eliza 
Wliite, the daughter of his employer, the owner of the 
Southern Literary Messenger. She was herself a lover 
of poetry and romance, and a dreamer of dreams, all 
of which had erelong merged into one sweet dream so 
secret, so sacred that she scarce dared own it to her 
own inner self, and its central figure was her father's 
handsome assistant editor, who rested in blissful igno- 
rance of the havoc he was making in her maiden heart, 
engrossed as he was in his own secret — his own romance. 

New energy, new zest, new life -seemed to have 
entered his blood. He had endless capacity for work 
as well as for pleasure and could write all day and 



224: THE DREAMER 

dance half the night and then lie awake star-gazing 
the other half and rise ready and eager for the day's 
work in the morning. Such a tonic — such a stimu- 
lant did his love for his faraway bride and his con- 
sciousness of her love for him prove. 

He was happy — very^ very happy, but he desired to 
be happier still. The simple, beautiful words of the 
old, old rite uttered in the dim, empty church had 
woven an invisible bond between him and the maiden 
whom he loved to call in his heart his wife though the 
time when he could claim her before the world was 
not yet. 

The miracle that this bond wrought in him was a 
revelation to him. Was the priest a wizard? Did the 
words of the ancient rite possess any intrinsic power of 
enchantment undreamed of by the uninitiated? 

He had not believed it possible for mortal to love 
more wholly — more madly than he had loved the little 
Virginia before that sacred ceremony, but after it he 
knew there were heights of love of which he had not 
hitherto had a glimpse. Just the right to say to his 
heart " She is my own — my wif e^ — " made her tenfold 
more precious than she had ever been before, but it 
also made the separation tenfold harder to bear — 
made it beyond his power to bear ! 

The Valley of the Many-Colored Grass had been 
dissolved — the spell that had brought it into being 
broken, by the separation, and he longed with a longing 
that was as hunger and thirst to reconstruct this magi- 
cal world in which he and his Virginia dwelt apart 
with her who was mother to them both, in Eichmond. 
And so, poor as he was, he arranged to bring Vir- 
ginia and Mother Clemm to Richmond and establish 



THE DREAMER 225 

them in a boarding house where he could see them 
often and wait with better grace the still happier day 
of making his marriage public. 

The day came more speedily than they had let 
themselves hope. The popularity of the Messenger 
and the fame of its assistant editor had grown with 
leaps and bounds. The new year brought the welcome 
gift of promotion to full editorship^ with an increase 
of salary. With the opening spring began plans for 
the divulging of the great secret — for public acknowl- 
edgment of the marriage. But how was it to be done? 
— That was the question! Edgar Poe knew too well 
the disapproval with which the world regarded secret 
marriages — with which he himself regarded them, 
ordinarily. His sense of refinement, of fitness, of the 
sacredness of the marriage tie, revolted from the very 
idea. 

In what fashion then, could he and his little bride 
proclaim their secret that would not do violence to 
their own taste or set a buzz of gossip going? That 
the horrid lips of gossip should so much as breathe 
the name of his Virginia — that Mrs. Grundy should 
dare shrug her decorous shoulders, if ever so slightly, 
at mention of that sacred name — . The bare sugges- 
tion was intolerable ! 

At last a solution offered itself to his mind. Not 
for an instant did he regret the sacred ceremony in 
Christ Church, Baltimore. Not for worlds would he 
have cut short for one moment of time the duration 
of the beautiful spiritual marriage when he had been 
able to say to himself : " She whose presence fills my 
heart and my life — whose spirit I can feel near me at 
my work, in my hours of recreation and in my dreams. 



226 THE DREAMER 

is my wife." But of this exquisite, this inexpressibly 
dear union the world was in utter ignorance. It was 
known only to the Mother, the priest and the aged 
sexton. To these witnesses always, as to themselves, 
their marriage would date from the moment when the 
blessing was invoked above their bowed heads in Christ 
Church, but to the world — why not let it date from 
the day in which they would claim each other before 
the world, in Richmond? 

The thing was most simple! A second ceremony 
in the presence of a few friends — a brief announce- 
ment in next day's paper — and their life would be be- 
gun with the dignity, the prestige, of public marriage. 

The sixteenth of May was the day chosen for the 
event which was more like a wedding in Arcady than 
in latter-day society. As at the secret ceremony, the 
customary preparations for a wedding were conspicu- 
ously absent; yet was not the whole town gala with 
sunshine and verdure and May-bloom and bird-song? 

Edgar Poe looked every inch a bridegroom as, with 
his girl-wife upon his arm, he stepped forth from Mrs. 
Yarrington's boarding-house,opposite the green slopes 
of Capitol Square. A bridegroom indeed! — plainly, 
but perfectly apparelled — handsome, proud, fearless — 
his great eyes luminous with solemn joy. 

The simplest of white frocks became Virginia's inno- 
cence and beauty more than costly bridal array and 
the nosegay of white violets above her chaste bosom 
was her only ornament. 

With this sweet pair came the happy mother and a 
little train of close friends. It was late afternoon. The 
sunshine was mellow and the air was filled with the 



THE DREAMER 237 

delicious insense which in mid-May the majestic pau- 
lonia tree drops from its purple bells and which is the 
very breath of the warm-natnred South. 

'No line of carriages stood at the door. No awning 
shut the picture they made from admiring eyes, but 
happily the little party chatted together as they strolled 
under over-arching greenery to the corner of Main and 
Seventh Streets, where in the prim parlor of the Pres- 
b3rterian minister, the words were pronounced which 
told the world that Edgar Poe and Virginia Clemm 
were one. 

Upon the return of the party to Mrs. Yarrington's, a 
cake was cut, the health and happiness of the bride 
and groom were drunk in wine of "Muddie's" own 
make, and the modest festival was over. 

How happy the young lovers and dreamers were in 
their home-making! Their housekeeping and furnish- 
ings were the simplest, but love made everything beau- 
tiful and sufficient. They had a garden in which they 
planted all their favorite flowers and to which came the 
birds — the birds with whom they had discovered a 
sudden kinship, for they too, were nesting — and filled 
it with music. And they sang and chatted as happily 
as the birds themselves as the pretty business pro- 
gressed. 

How delightful it was to receive their friends, to- 
gether, in their own home and at their own board — 
Eddie's old friends, especially. Eob Stanard, now a 
prosperous lawyer, and Eob Sully whose reputation as 
an artist was growing, were the first to call and present 
their compliments to the bride and groom; and how 
cordial they were ! How affectionate to Eddie — how 



228 THE DREAMER 

warm in their expressions of friendship for the girl- 
wife ! 

Virginia found it the greatest fun imaginable to go 
to market with " Mnddie/' with a basket hanging 
from her pretty arm. The market men and women 
began to daily watch for the sweet face and tripping 
step of the exquisite child whom it seemed so comical 
to address as ^' Mrs. Poe/' and who rewarded their 
open admiration with the loveliest smile, the prettiest 
words of greeting and interest, the merriest rippling 
laugh that rang through the market place and waked 
echoes in many a heart that had believed itself a stranger 
to joy. 

And the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass was re- 
constructed in even more than its old beauty. The 
flowers of love and contentment and innocent pleasure 
that besprinkled its green carpet had never been so 
many or so gay, the dream-mountains that shut it in 
from the rest of the world were as fair as sunset clouds, 
and the peace that flowed through it as a river broke 
into singing as it flowed. 

Meantime Edgar Poe worked — and worked — and 
worked. 

Every number of the Messenger contained page after 
page of the brilliantly conceived and artistically worded 
product of his brain and pen. His heart — his imagi- 
nation satisfied and at rest in the love and comrade- 
ship of a woman who fulfilled his ideal of beauty, of 
character, and of charm, whose mind he himself had 
taught and trained to appreciate and to love the things 
that meant most to him, whose sympathy responded to 
his every mood, whose voice soothed his tired nerves 



TEE DREAMER 229 

with the music that was one of the necessities of his 
temperament^ a woman, withal, who lived with no 
other thought than to love and be loved by him — his 
harassing devils cast out by this true heartsease, Edgar 
Poe^s industry and his power of mental production 
were almost past belief. 

As he worked a dream that had long been half- 
formed in his brain took definite shape and became 
the moving influence of the intellectual side of his 
life. Plis literary conscience had always been strict — 
even exacting? — with him, making him push the quest 
for the right word in which to express his idea — just 
the right word, no other — to its farthest limit. Urged 
by this conscience, he could rarely ever feel that his 
work was finished, but kept revising, polishing and re- 
publishing it in improved form, even after it had 
been once given to the world. He had in his youth 
contemplated serving his country as a soldier. He 
now began to dream of serving her as a captain of 
literature, as it were — as a defender of purity of style; 
for this dream which became the most serious purpose 
of his life was of raising the standard of American 
letters to the ideal perfection after which he strove 
in his own writings. 

For his campaign a trusty weapon was at hand in 
the editorial department of the Southern Literary Mes- 
senger, which he turned into a sword of fearless, merci- 
less criticism. 

Literary criticism (so called) in America had been 
hitherto mere puffery — puffery for the most part of 
weak, prolix, commonplace scribblings of little would- 
be authors and poets. A reformation in criticism, 
therefore, Edgar Poe conceived to be the only remedy 



230 THE DREAMER 

for the prevalent mediocrity in writing that was vitiat- 
ing the taste of the day, the only hope of placing 
American literature upon a footing of equality with 
that of England — in a word, for bringing about any- 
thing approaching the perfection of which he dreamed. 

The new kind of criticism to which he introduced his 
readers created a sensation by reason of its very nov- 
elty. His brilliant, but withering critiques were more 
eagerly looked for than the most tlirilling of his stories, 
and though the little, namby-pamby authors whom the 
gleaming sword mowed down by tens were his and the 
Messenger's enemies for life, the interested readers that 
were gathered in by hundreds were loud in their praise 
of the progressiveness of the magazine and the genius 
of the man who was making it. 

In the N"orth as well as the South the name of 
Edgar Poe was now on many lips and serious atten- 
tion began to be paid to the opinion of the Southern 
Literary Messenger. 



THE DREAMER 231 



CHAPPTEE XXIII. 

Between his literary work, his home and his social 
life in Eichmond, it would seem that every need of The 
Dreamer's being was now satisfied and the days of his 
life were moving in perfect harmony. But "the little 
rift within the lute " all too soon made its appearance. 
It was caused by the alarm of Mr. White, the owner 
and founder of the Messenger. 

"Little Tom White'' was a most admirable man — 
within his limitations. If he was not especially inter- 
esting, his daughter Eliza of the violet eyes was, and 
he was reliable — which was better. He had a kind 
little heart and a clear little business, head and his 
advice upon all matters (within his experience) was 
safe. Though he saw from the handsome increase in 
the number of the Messenger's subscribers that hib 
young editor was a valuable aid, he did not realize how 
valuable. Indeed, Edgar Poe and his style of writing 
were entirely outside of Mr. Wliite's experience. They 
were so altogether unlike anything he had known be- 
fore that in spite of the praise of the thousands of 
readers which they had brought to the magazine the 
dissatisfaction of the tens of little namby-pamby au- 
thors alarmed him. Edgar Poe found him one morn- 
ing in a state of positive trepidation. He sat at his 
desk in the Messenger office with the morning's mail — 
an unusually large pile of it — before him. In it there 
were a number of new subscriptions, several letters 
from the little authors protesting against the manner 
in which their works were handled in the review col- 



232 THE DREAMER 

Timns of the magazine and one or two from well-known 
and highly respected country gentlemen expressing 
their disapproval of the strangeness in Edgar Poe's 
tales and poems. 

Mr. White appreciated the genius of his editor — 
within his limitations — but he was afraid of it and 
these letters made him more afraid of it. He saw 
that he must speak to Edgar — add his protest to the 
protests of the little authors and the country gentle- 
men and see if he could not persuade him to tone 
down the sharpness of his criticisms and the strange-" 
ness of his stories. 

It was with a feeling of relief that he saw the trim, 
black-clad figure of the young editor and author at the 
door, for he would like to settle the business before 
him at once. His manner was graved — solemn — as he 
approached the subject upon which his employe must 
be spoken to. 

^^ Edgar," he said, when good-mornings had been 
exchanged, " I want you to read these letters. They 
are in the same line as some others we have been re- 
ceiving lately — but more so — decidedly more so." 

" Ah ? " said The Dreamer, as he seated himself at 
the desk and began to unfold and glance over the let- 
ters. 

" Little Tom " watched his face with a feeling of 
wonder at the look of mixed scorn and amusement that 
appeared in the expressive eyes and mouth as he read. 
Finally the anxious little man laid his hand upon the 
arm of his unruly assistant, with an air of kindly 
patronage. 

" You have talent, Edgar," he said, with a touch of 
condescension, " Good talent — especially for criticism — 



THE DREAMER 233 

and will some day make your mark in that line 
if you will stick to it and let these weird stories alone. 
We must have fewer of the stories in future and more 
critiques, but milder ones. It is the critiques that the 
readers want; but in both stories and critiques you 
must put a restraint on that pen of yours, Edgar. In 
the stories less of the weird — the strange — in the 
critiques, less of the satirical. Let moderation be your 
watchword, my boy. Cultivate moderation in your 
writing, and with your endowment you will make a 
name for yourself as well as the magazine.'^ 

Edgar Poe was all attention — respectful attention 
that was most encouraging— while Mr. White was 
speaking, and v/hen he had finished sat with a contem- 
plative look in his eyes, as if weighing the words he 
had just heard. Presently he looked up and with the 
expression of face and voice of one who in all serious- 
ness seeks information, asked, 

'^Is moderation really the word you are after, Mr. 
White, or is it mediocrity ? " 

The announcement at the very moment when the 
question was put, of a visitor — a welcome one, for he 
brought a new subscription — precluded a reply, and in 
the busy day that followed the broken thread of con- 
versation was never taken up again. But the un- 
answered question left Mr. Wliite with a confused 
sense which stayed with him during the whole day 
and at intervals all through it he was aslring himself 
what Edgar Poe meant. Truly his talented employe 
was a puzzling fellow! Could it be possible that the 
question asked with that serious face, that quiet re- 
spectful air, was intended for a joke? That the impu- 
dent fellow could have been quizzing him ? No wonder 



234 THE DREAMER 

his stories gave people shivers — there was at times 
something about the fellow himself which was posi- 
tively ■ancanny! 

That he and '^ little Tom " would always see opposite 
sides of the picture became more and more apparent 
to The Dreamer as time went on and along with this 
difficulty another and a more serious one arose. 

Though the amount of work — of successful work, for 
it brought the Messenger a steadily increasing stream 
of new subscribers — which he was now putting forth, 
should have surrounded the beloved wife and mother 
with luxuries and placed him beyond the reach of finan- 
cial embarrassment, the returns he received from the 
entire fruitage of his brilliant talent — his untiring 
pen — at this the prime-time of his life — in the full- 
ness of mental and physical vigour, was so small that 
he was constantly harrassed by debt and frequently 
reduced to the humiliating necessity of borrowing from 
his friends to make two ends meet. 

The plain truth was gradually borne in upon him — 
the prizes of fame and wealth that for the sake of his 
sweet bride he coveted more earnestly than ever before, 
were not to be found, by him, in Richmond, or as an 
employe of Mr. Wliite. But the hues of the bow of 
promise with which hope spanned the sky of his inward 
vision were still bright, and he believed that at its end 
the coveted prizes would surely still be found — pro- 
vided he did not lose heart and give up the quest. In- 
dications of the growth of his reputation at the North 
had been many. In the North the facilities for pub- 
lishing were so much more abundant than in the South. 
The publishing houses and the periodicals of New York, 
of Boston, and of Philadelphia would create a demand 



THE DREAMER 235 

for literary work — and from these large cities his mes- 
sage to the world would go out with greater authority 
than from a small town like Richmond. 

It was not until the year 1838 that he finally resolved 
to make the break and sent in his resignation to the 
Messenger. In the three years since his first appear- 
ance in its columns the number of names upon its sub- 
scription list had increased from seven hundred to five 
thousand. 

Though Edgar Poe's connection with the magazine 
as editor was at an end, Mr. Wliite took pains to an- 
nounce that he was to continue to be a regular con- 
tributor and the appearance of his serial story, " Arthur 
Gordon Pym/' then running, was to be uninterrupted. 

It was a far cry from the gardens and porches and 
open houses of Richmond to the streets of New York — 
from the easy going country town where society held 
but one circle, to a city, with its locked doors and its 
wheels within wheels. Indeed, the single circle in 
Richmond, bound together as it was by the elastic, 
but secure, tie of Virginia cousinship and neighborliness 
then regarded as almost the same thing as relationship, 
was practically one big family. Whoever was not your 
cousin or your neighbor was the next best thing — 
either your neighbor's cousin or your cousin's neigh- 
bor — so there you were. 

Though Edgar and Virginia Poe and the Widow 
Clemm had no blood kin in Richmond they were, dur- 
ing those two years' residence there, taken into the 
very heart of this pleasant, kindly circle, and it was with 
keen homesickness that they realized that " in a whole 
cityful friends they had none." 



236 THE DREAMER 

But if this trio of dreamers felt strangely out of place 
in the streets of New York, they looked more so. As 
they sauntered along, in their leisurely southern fash- 
ion, their picturesque appearance arrested the gaze of 
many a hurrying passer-hy. In contrast to the up-to- 
date, alert, keen-eyed crowd upon the busy streets, the 
air of distinction which marked them everywhere was 
more pronounced than ever. They gave the impression 
of a certain exquisite fineness of quality, combined with 
quaintness, that one is sensible of in looking upon rare 
china. 

In and out; — in and out — among the crowds of 
these streets where being a stranger he felt himself 
peculiarly alone, Edgar the Dreamer walked many days 
in his quest for work. Here, there and everywhere, his 
pale face and solemn eyes with less and less of hope in 
them were seen. He had been right in believing that 
his reputation was growing and had reached New York 
— yet no one wanted his work. The supply of literature 
exceeded the demand, he was told everywhere. It is 
true that he succeeded in placing an occasional article, 
for which he would be paid the merest pittance. Man 
should not expect to live by writing alone, he found to 
be the general opinion — he should have a business or 
profession and do his scribbling in the left-over hours. 

Still, his appearance at the door of a newspaper, maga- 
zine or book publisher's office, accompanied by the an- 
nouncement of his name, brought him respect and a 
polite hearing — if that could afford any satisfaction to 
a man whose darling wife was growing wan from in- 
sufficient food. 

One devoted friend he and his family made in Mr. 
Gowans, a Scotchman and a book-collector of means 



THE DREAMER 237 

and cultivation^ whose fancy for them went so far as 
to induce him to become a member of the unique little 
family in the dingy wooden shanty which they had 
succeeded in renting for a song. To this old gentle- 
man^ who had the reputation of being something of a 
crank, The Dreamer's conversation and Virginia's beauty 
and exquisite singing were never-failing wells of de- 
light^ while the generous sum that he paid for the privi- 
lege of sharing their home was an equal benefit to them 
and went a long way toward supplying the simple table. 
The little checks which "little Tom" White sent for 
the monthly instalments of " Arthur Gordon Pym/' 
upon which his ex-editor industriously worked, were 
also most welcome. But with all they could scrape 
together the income was insufficient to keep three souls 
within three bodies, and three bodies decently covered. 

Before the year in New York was out the rainbow was 
pale in the sky — its colors were faded and its end was 
invisible — obscured by lowering clouds. At the mo- 
ment when it seemed faintest it came out clear again — 
this time setting toward Philadelphia, whose name the 
hope that rarely left him for long at a time whispered in 
The Dreamer's ear. 

Why not Philadelphia? Philadelphia — then the 
acknowledged seat of the empire of Letters. Philadel- 
phia — the city of Penn, the " City of Brotherly Love." 
There was for one of The Dreamer^s superstitious turn 
of mind and his love of words and belief in their power, 
an attraction — a significance in the very names. He 
said them over and over again to himself — rolled them 
on his tongue, fascinated with their sound and with 
their suggestiveness. 

He bade Virginia and " Muddie " keep up brave 



238 THE DREAMER 

hearts, for they would turn their backs upon this cold, 
inhospitable New York and set up their household gods 
in the " City of Brotherly Love." The city of Penn, he 
added, was the place for one of his calling — laughing as 
he spoke, at the feeble pun — but there was new hope 
and life in the laugh. In Penn's city, even if disap- 
pointments should come they would be able to bear them, 
for how should human beings suffer in the " City of 
Brotherly Love?^' 



THE DREAMER 239 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



The year was waning— the year 1838— when Edgar 
Poe removed his family from New York. About the 
hour of noon, upon a pleasant day of the spring follow- 
ing, he might have been seen to turn from the paved 
streets of the " City of Brotherly Love/' and to enter, 
and walk briskly along, a grassy thoroughfare of Spring 
Garden — a village-like suburb. 

He was going home to Virginia and the Mother— to 
a new home in this village which they had been first 
tempted to explore by its delightful name and which 
they had found seeing was to love, for in its appearance 
the name was justified. The quiet streets were lined 
with trees just coming into leaf, in which birds were 
building, happy and unafraid, and spring flowers were 
blooming in little plots before many of the unpretentious 
homes. 

The place also possessed a more practical attraction 
in the reasonableness of its house-rents. Delightfully 
low was the price asked for a small, Dutch-roofed cot- 
tage that was just to their minds. It was small, yet 
quite large enough to hold the three and their modest 
possessions, and about it hung a quaint charm that 
might have been wanting in a more ambitious abode. 
Though in excellent preservation it had a pleasantly 
time-worn air and there was moss, in velvety green 
patches, on its sloping roof. It was set somewhat back 
from the street, with a bit of garden spot in front of it, 
in whose rich soil violets and single hyacinths — blue 
and whiten- were blooming, and its square porch sup- 



240 THE DREAMER 

ported a climbing rose^ heavy with buds, that only 
needed training to make it a bower of beauty. 

After having tried several more or less unsatisfactory 
homes during their brief residence in Philadelphia., 
they felt that they had at last found one that filled 
their requirements, and had promptly moved in. There 
were no servants — maids would have been in the way 
they happily told each other — but Virginia and her 
mother had positive genius for neatness and order. At 
their touch things seemed to fly by magic into the places 
where they would look best and at the same time be 
most convenient, and it was astonishing how quickly the 
arrangement of their small belongings converted the 
cottage into a home. 

It was with light heart and step that the master of 
the house took his way homeward to the mid-day meal. 
The periodicals of the " City of Brotherly Love " were 
keeping him busy, and there was at that moment money 
in his pocket — not much, but still it was money — that 
day received for his latest story. 

As he drew near a corner just around which his new 
roof -tree stood, he stopped suddenly — in the attitude of 
one who listens. Peal after peal of rippling laughter 
was filling the air with music. In his vivid eyes, as 
he listened, shone the soft light of love and a smile of 
infinite tenderness played about his lips. Well he knew 
from what lovel}^, girlish throat came the merry sounds 
— sweet and clear as a chime of silver bells. A quick- 
ened step brought him instantly in view of her and the 
cause of her mirth. 

She stood in the rose-hooded doorway leaning upon a 
broom. Her cheeks were pink with the exertion she 
had been making and her sleeves were rolled up, leaving 



THE DREAMER 241 

her dimpled, white arms bare to the elbow. Her soft 
eyes were radiant and she was laughing for sheer delight 
in the picture the stately " Muddie " made white-wash- 
ing the palings that enclosed the wee garden-spot from 
the street. When she saw her husband at the gate she 
dropped her broom and ran into his arms like a child. 

" Oh, Buddie, Buddie/' she cried, " are not our pal- 
ings beautiful? Muddie did them for a surprise for 
you ! " 

" Buddie " was enthusiastic in admiration of the 
white palings and praised the gentle white-washer to 
the skies. Then the three happy workers went inside 
to their simple repast, which the sauce of content turned 
into a banquet. 

The door had been left open to the sunshine and the 
result was an unexpected guest — a handsome tortoise- 
shell kitten which strayed in to ask a share of their 
meal. She paused, timidly, upon the threshold for a 
moment, then fixing her amber eyes upon The Dreamer, 
made straight for him and arching her back and waving 
her tail like a plume, in the air she rubbed her glossy 
sides against his ankle in a manner that was truly 
irresistible. All three gave her a warm welcome. 
Edgar regarded her appearance as a good omen; Vir- 
ginia was delighted to have a pet, and " Catalina," as 
they named her, became from the moment a regular 
and favorite member of the family. 

The cottage contained but five rooms — three down- 
stairs (including the kitchen) and upstairs two, with 
low-pitched, shelving walls and narrow little slits of 
windows on a level with the floor. But as has been 
said, it was large enough — large enough to shelter love 



242 TH E DREAM ER 

and happiness and genius — large enough to hold the 
dream of the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass, with 
its fair river and its enchanted trees and flowers, in 
which the three dreamers lived apart and for each other 
only. 

It was large enough for the freest expansion the 
world had yet seen of the vivid-hued imagination of 
Edgar Poe. 

Night and day his brain was busy — " fancy unto 
fancy linking'' — and the periodicals teemed with his 
work. 

In The American Museum, of Baltimore appeared 
his fantastic prose-poem, " Ligeia/' with his theory of 
the power of the human will for a text^ — his favorite 
of all of his " tales " — his favorite, in the weakness of 
whose own will lay the real tragedy of his life ! In The 
Gift, of Philadelphia, appeared, a little later the dra- 
matic *^^ conscience-story,'' "William Wilson," with its 
clear-cut pictures of school-life at old Stoke-N'ewington. 
The Baltimore Booh gave the thrilling fable, " Silence," 
to the world. The weirdly beautiful " Haunted Palace " 
and " The Fall of the House of Usher " followed in 
quick succession — in The American Museum,. 

"The Fall of the House of Usher," brought The 
Dreamer a pat-on-the back from "little Tom" White, 
who in writing of the tale in The Southern Literary 
Messenger, informed the world : " We always predicted 
that Mr. Poe would reach a high grade in American 
literature; only we wish Mr. Poe would stick to the 
department of criticism ; there he is an able professor." 

Wrote James Eussell Lowell, of the same story, 

"Had its author written nothing else it would have 
been enough to stamp him as a man of genius." 



THE DREAMER 343 

The cottage in Spring Garden was large enough too, 
for the sweet nses of hospitality. By the time the roses 
on the porch were open, friends and admirers began 
to iind there way to it, and all who came through the 
white-washed gate and sat down in the green-hooded 
porch or passed through it into the bright and tasteful 
rooms felt the poetic charm which this son of genius and 
his exquisite bit of a wife and the stately mother with 
the " Mater Dolorosa " expression, threw over their sim- 
ple surroundings. 

Among those who found their way thither was 
"Billy" Burton, an Englishman, and an actor, who 
though a graduate of Cambridge was "better known 
as a commedian than as a literary man." He had writ- 
ten several books, however, and was the publisher of 
The Gentleman's Magazine, of Philadelphia. Here too, 
came intimately, Mr. Alexander, one of the founders 
of The Saturday Evening Post, to which The Dreamer 
was a frequent contributor, and Mr. Clarke, first editor 
of The Post and others of what Edgar Poe's friend, 
Wilmer, would have dubbed the " press gang " of Phila- 
delphia. 

To be intimate with The Dreamer meant to adore the 
little wife with the face of a Luca della Robbia choris- 
ter and the voice which should have belonged to one — 
with the merry, irresistible ways of a perfectly happy 
child, — and to revere the mother. 

The cottage was also found to be large enough (as 
the fame of its master grew) to be the destination of 
letters from the literary stars of the day. Longfellow 
and Lowell and Washington Irving, on this side of the 
water, and Dickens, in England, were among Edgar 



344 THE DREAMER 

Poe's numerous correspondents while a dweller in the 
rose-embowered cottage in Spring Garden. 

In addition to the stories^ poems, essays and critiques 
which the indefatigable Dreamer was putting out, he 
found time to publish a collection of his " Tales of the 
Grotesque and Arabesque," in book form. He was also 
(unfortunately for him) induced to prepare a work on 
sea-shells for the use of schools — " The Conchologist's 
'First Book," it was called. This was unmistakably a 
mere " pot-boiler " and confessedly a compilation, but 
it set the little authors whose namby-pamby works the 
self-appointed Defender of the Purity of Style in Amer- 
ican Letters had consigned to an early grave, like a 
nest of hornets buzzing about his ears. 

" Plagarism ! " was the burden of their hum. 

Even while the discordant chorus was being chanted, 
however, his wonderfully original tales continued to 
make their appearance at intervals — chiefly in The^ 
Gentleman's Magazine, whose editor, at "Billy" Bur- 
ton's invitation, he had become. 

In the midst of all this activity one of his old and 
most cherished dreams took more definite shape than 
ever before — the dream of becoming himself the founder 
of a magazine in which he could write as his genius and 
his fancy should dictate without having to be constantly 
making compromises with editors and proprietors — a 
periodical which would fulfil his ideal of magazine 
literature, which he predicted would be the leading 
literature of the future. With his prophetic eye he 
foresaw the high pressure under which the American of 
coming years would live, and he never lost an oppor- 
tunity to express the opinion that the reader of the fu- 



THE DREAMER 245 

tiire would give preference to the essay, or story, or 
poem which could be read at a sitting— which would 
waste no time in preamble or conclusion, but in which 
every word would be chosen by the literary artist with 
the nicety with which the painter selects the exact tint 
he needs, and in which every word would tell. And 
such works he conceived it would be especially the pro- 
vince of the magazine to present. 

He went so far as to prepare a prospectus and adver- 
tise for subscribers to The Penn Monthly, as he pro- 
posed naming this child of his hopes, and his proposi- 
tion to enter the field of magazine publishing not only 
as an editor, but as a proprietor, bade fair to be the 
rock upon which he and his friend "Billy" Burton 
would split. They came to an understanding finally, 
however, for when Mr. Burton, a little later, decided to 
abandon The Gentleman's Magazine and devote himself 
exclusively to the theatre, he said to Mr. George R. 
Graham, the owner of The Caslet, to whom he sold 
out, 

" By the way, Graham, there's one thing I want to 
ask, and that is that you will take care of my young 
editor." 

Edgar Poe was at the moment lost in the happy 
dream of his own Penn Monthly which he conceived 
would not only take care of him and his family, but 
would give his genius free rein. He was resolved to 
put the best of himself into it, and the best of outside 
contributions he could succeed in procuring. Its criti- 
cisms should be "sternly just, guided only by the 
purest rules of Art, analyzing and urging these rules 
as it applied them; holding itself aloof from all per- 
. .;;l|sonal bias, acknowledging no fear save that of outraging 



246 THE BREAM EE 

the right." It would " endeavor to support the gen- 
eral interests of the republic of letters — regarding the 
world at large as the true audience of the author/' he 
determined, and he declared in his prospectus. 

Dear to his heart as was this dream of dreams of his 
intellectual life, he was soon to realize that its fulfilment 
was not to be. At least — not yet, for he comforted his 
own heart and Virginia's and " Muddie's " with the 
assurance that it was but a case of hope deferred again. 

As he was bracing himself for this fresh disappoint- 
ment, Mr. Graham, the purchaser of The Gentlemen's 
Magazine which he proposed to combine with The Cas- 
ket in the creation of Graham's Magazine, sat in his 
office with a paper before him which the initiated 
would have at once recognized as an Edgar Poe manu- 
script. It was a long, narrow strip, formed by pasting 
pages together endwise, and had been submitted in a 
tight roll which Mr. Graham unrolled as he read. The 
title at the top of the strip, in The Dreamer's neat, 
legible handwriting was, " The Man of the Crowd." 

There was nothing gruesome about Mr. Graham. His 
candid brow, his kindling blue eye, his fresh-colored 
cheeks, the genial curve of his lip and his strong but 
amiable chin, spoke of a sunshiny nature, with neither 
taste nor turn for the weird. But, as he read, the 
strange " conscience-story " moved him — held him in 
a grip of intense interest — wove a spell around him. 
He was on the lookout for original material — undoubt- 
edly he had it in this manuscript. He recalled " Billy " 
Burton's last words to him : " Take care of my young 
editor." 

A smile lighted his pleasant face. He had his own 
mental endowments — generous ones — and without the 



THE DREAMER 247 

least conceit he knew it; but he had no ambition to 
patronize genius. 

^^ The writer of this story is quite able to take care 
of himselt" he informed his inner consciousness, " And 
if I can only form a connection with him it will doubt- 
less be a case of the young editor's taking care of me." 

Upon the next afternoon Mr. Graham set out on a 
pilgrimage to Spring Garden. Though it was Novem- 
ber the air was mild and the sunshine was mellow. Was 
the slcy always so blue in Spring Garden, he wondered ? 
He found the rose-embowered cottage without difficulty, 
for he had obtained minute directions. The roses were 
all gone but the foliage was still green and the little 
white-paled garden was bright with the sunset-hued 
flowers of autumn. Flowers and cottage stood bathed 
in the light of the golden afternoon — the picture of 
serenity. Wliat marked this quaint, small homestead ? — 
set back from the quiet village street — tucked away 
behind its garden-spot from the din of the world? 
What made it different from others of its neighborhood 
and character? Was it just a notion of his (Mr. Gra- 
ham wondered) that made him feel that here was poetry 
pure and simple? — visible poetry? 

With sensations of keen interest he lifted the knocker. 
Edgar Poe himself opened the door and his captivating 
smile, cordial hand-clasp and words of warm, as well as 
courtly, greeting raised the visitor instantly from the 
ranks of the caller to the place of a friend. Mr. Gra- 
ham had met Edgar Poe before and had felt his charm, 
but he now told himself that to know him one must 
see him under his own roof, and in the character of 
host. 

As the door was opened a flood of music floated out. 



248 THE DREAMER 

A divinely sweet mezzo-soprano voice was singing to 
the accompaniment of a harp. As the master of the 
house flung wide the sitting-room door and announced 
the visitor, the sounds ceased, but the musician sat with 
her hands resting upon the gilded strings for a mo- 
ment, her eyes turned in inquiry toward the door, 
then rose and with the simplicity of a child came 
forward to place her hand in that of Mr. Graham. 
Mother Clemm who sat near the window with a piece 
of sewing in her lap also arose, and with gentle dignity 
came forward to be introduced and to do her part in 
making the guest welcome. 

As he took the seat proffered him and entered upon 
the exchange of commonplace phrases with which a visit 
of a comparative stranger is apt to begin, Mr. Graham's 
blue eyes gathered in the details of the reposeful pic- 
ture of which he had become a part. The open fire, 
the sunshine lying on the bare but spotless floor, the 
vases filled with flowers, the few simple pieces of fur- 
niture so fitly disposed that they produced a sense of 
unusual completeness and satisfaction — the row of 
books, the harp, the cat dosing upon the hearth, — and 
finally, the people. The master of the house — distin- 
guished, handsome, dominant, genial, his young wife, 
the embodiment of soft, poetic beauty, and the mother 
with her saint-like face and gentle, composed manner — 
her expressive hands busy with her needle work. "Was 
it possible that such a home — such a household — was 
always there, keeping the even tenor of its way among 
the unpicturesque conventions of the modern world? 

After the first formalities had been exchanged he 
had delicately intimated that h^ had come on business, 
but he soon began to see that whatever his business 



THE DREAMER 249 

might be it was to be dispatched right there, in the 
bosom of the family. This was irregular and unusual, 
yet, somehow, it did not seem unnatural, and he found 
that the presence of the women of the poet's household 
was not the least restraint upon the freedom of their 
discussion. 

After some words of commendation of the story, 
" The Man of the Crowd,'' which he accepted for the 
next number of his magazine, he came to the real busi- 
ness of the afternoon. 

"Mr. Poe," said he, "I believe you know that 
with the new year The Oentlemarh's Magazine and The 
Casket will be combined to form Graham's Magazine 
which it is my intention to make the best monthly, in 
contributed articles and editorial opinion, in this coun- 
try. Mr. Poe I want an editor capable of making it 
this. I want you. What do you say to undertaking 
it?" 

As he sat with his eyes fixed upon The Dreamer's 
eyes waiting for an answer he could not see the quick 
clasping of the widow's hands the uplifting of her 
expressive face which plainly said " Thank God," or ' 
the sudden illumination in the soft eyes of Virginia. 
But the transformation in the beautiful face of the 
man before him held him spell-bound. Edgar Poe's 
great eyes were glowing with sudden pleasure the 
curves of his mouth grew sweet, his whole countenance 
softened. 

" This is very good of you, Mr. Graham," he said, 
his low, musical voice, warm with feeling. "Your offer 
places me upon firm ground once more. To be frank 
with you, the failure, through lack of capital, of my 
attempt to establish a magazine of my own (since the 



250 TEE DREAMER 

severing of my connection with Burton, which gave me 
my only regular income) has left me hanging by the 
eyelids, as it were, and I have been wondering how 
long I could hold on with only the small, irregular 
sums coming in from the sale of my stories to depend 
upon. Your offer at this time means more to me than 
I can express/^ 

His girl-wife stole to his side and with pretty grace, 
unembarrassed by the presence of Mr. Graham, leaned 
over his chair and pressed her lips upon his brow. 

"But you know, Buddie," she murmured in a voice 
that was like a dove's, "I always told you something 
would come along ! '^ 

Darkness fell and lamps were lighted, and still Mr. 
Graham sat on and on as though too fascinated by the 
charm of the little circle to move. To his own sur- 
prise he found himself accepting the invitation to re- 
main to supper. The simple table was beautiful with 
the dainty touch of Mother Clemm and Virginia, and 
the very frugality of the meal seemed a virtue. 

After supper his host, not the least of whose accom- 
plishments was the rare one of reading aloud accept- 
ably, was persuaded to read some of his own poems — 
Mr. Graham asking for certain special pieces. Among 
these were the lines " To Helen," which were recited 
with a fervor approaching solemnity. 

" Tell him about Helen, Eddie," murmured Vir- 
ginia, who sat by his side. 

" Yes, do tell me ! " urged Mr. Graham, quickly. 
And with his eyes brooding and dreamy, the poet went 
over, in touching and beautiful words, the story of 



THE DREAMER 251 

what he always felt and declared to be " the first pure 
passion of his soul/^ 

In the silence that followed he arose and took from 
the wall a small picture — a pencil-sketch of a lovely- 
head. 

" This is a drawing of her made by myself," he 
said. '^'^It was done from memory, but is a good like- 
ness. I needed no sitting to make her likeness." 

When he had shown Mr. Graham the picture, he 
hung it back in its place and a gentle hush fell upon 
the little group. Speech seemed out of place after the 
moving recital and the four sat gazing into the embers, 
each sunk in his or her own dreams. 

The poet was the first to speak. 

" Some music Sissy," he said turning to Virginia. 
" I want Mr. Graham to hear you." 

" She arose at once and seating herself at the harp, 
struck some soft, bell-like chords while she waited for 
" Buddie " to decide what she should sing. 

" Let it be something sweet and low," he said, " and 
simple. Something of Tom Moore's, for instance. You 
know my theory, anything but the simplest music to be 
appreciated — to reach the soul — must be heard alone." 

The harp accompaniment rippled forth, and in a 
moment more melted into the rich, sweet passionate 
tones of her voice as she told in musical numbers a 
heart-breaking story of love and parting. 

Ballad after ballad followed while the little audience 
sat entranced. Finally when the singer returned to 
her seat by the side of her husband, the conversation 
turned upon music. Mr. Graham commented upon 
his host's theory that all music but the simplest should, 
for its best effect, be listened to in solitude. 



252 THE DREAMER 

^^Yes/' said The Dreamer, "It is (like the happi- 
ness felt in the contemplation of natural scenery) much 
enhanced by seclusion. The man who would behold 
aright the glory of God as expressed in dark valleys, 
gray rocks, waters that silently smile and forests that 
sigh in uneasy slumbers, and the proud, watchful moun- 
tains that look down upon all — the man that would 
not only look upon these with his natural eye but feed 
his soul upon them as a sacrament, must do so in soli- 
tude. And so too, I hold, should one listen to the deep 
harmonies of music of the highest class." 

At length the hour came when Mr. Graham felt that 
he must tear himself away — bring this strange visit to 
an end. Before going he felt moved by an impulse to 
express something of the effect it had had upon him. 

"Mr. Poe," he said, "I wish to thank you for one 
of the most delightful evenings of my life and for hav- 
ing taken me into the heart of your home. I can find 
no words in which to express my appreciation. To- 
night, at your fireside, it seems to me that I have had 
for the first time in my life a clear understanding of 
the word happiness." 

Edgar Poe smiled, dreamily. 

" Why should we not be happy here ? " he answered. 
" Concerning happiness, my dear Mr. Garham, I have 
a little creed of my own. If I could only persuade 
others to adopt it there would be more happy people — 
far more contented ones — in the world." 

" And the articles of your creed ? " queried Mr. 
Graham. 

" Are only four. First, free exercise in the 

open air, and plenty of it. This brings health — which 

I is a kind of happiness in itself — that attainable by any 



THE DREAMER 253 

other means is scarcely worth the name. Second, love 
of woman. I need not tell yon that my life fulfils 
that condition.^' (As he spoke, his eyes, with an ex- 
pression of ineffable tenderness, wandered for a mo- 
ment, — and it seemed involuntarily — in the direction 
of his wife) . " The third condition is contempt for 
ambition. Would that I could tell you that I have 
attained to that! When I do, there will be little in 
this world to be desired by me. The fourth and last 
is an object of unceasing pursuit. This is the most 
important of all, for I believe that the extent of one's 
happiness is in proportion to the spirituality of this 
object. In this I am especially fortunate, for no more 
elevating pursuit exists, I think, than that of syste- 
matically endeavoring to bring to its highest perfection 
the art of literature." 

" I notice you do not mention money in your creed," 
remarked his guest. 

" No, neither do I mention air. Both the one and 
the other are essential to life, and to the keeping to- 
gether of body and soul. It goes without saying that 
the necessities of life are necessary to happiness. But 
money — meaning wealth — while it makes indulgence 
in pleasures possible, has nothing to do with happi- 
ness. Indeed the very pleasure it ensures often obscure 
highest happiness — the happiness of exaltation of the 
soul, of exercise of the intellect. What has money to 
do with happiness? It is a happiness to wonder — it 
is a happiness to dream. Your over-fed, jewel-decked, 
pleasure-drunk rich man or woman is too deeply em- 
bedded in flesh and sense to do either. No " — he 
mused, his eyes on the glowing coals in the grate, " No 
— I have no desire for wealth — for more than enough 
money to keep my wife and mother comfortable. They, 



254 THE DREAMER 

like m3^self, have learned the lesson of being poor and 
happy. But I must keep them above want — I will 
keep them above want ! " As he repeated the words the 
meditative mood dropped from him. He straightened 
himself in his chair with sudden energy, his voice trem- 
bled and sunk almost to a whisper, in place of the 
dreamy look his eyes flamed with passion. 

" Mr. Graham," he exclaimed, " to see those you love 
better than your own soul in want, and, in spite of 
working like mad, to be powerless to raise them out of 
it, is hell ! " 

A second time the exquisite child-wife slipped quick- 
ly, noiselessly, to his side and with the same easy 
grace leaned over and touched his brow with her lips, 
but this time instead of moving away, remained hang- 
ing over the back of his chair, her fair hand gently 
toying with the ringlets on his brow. He was calm in 
an instant. 

" I mean, of course, such a condition would be in- 
tolerable provided it should ever exist," he added. 

As the visitor stepped from the cottage door into 
the chill of the bright November night, and made his 
way down the little path of flagstones — irregularly 
shaped and clumsily laid down, so that mossy turf 
which was still green, appeared between them — he felt 
that he was stepping back into a flat, stale and un- 
profitable world from one of the enchanted regions, 
" out of space, out of time," of Poe's own creation. 

He had indeed, had a revelation of harmonious home- 
life such as he had not guessed existed in a work-a-day 
world — of the music, the poetry of living. He had 
had a glimpse into the Valley of the Many-Colored 
Grass. 



THE DREAMER 255 



CHAPTER XXV. 



The next morning found Mr. Graham still under the 
spell of the evening with the Poes. He caught him- 
self impatiently watching the clock, for the man under 
whose charm he had come was to call at a certain 
hour, to confer with him in regard to the magazine. 
He could hear him coming (stepping briskly and whist- 
ling a "Moore's Melody") before the rap upon the 
door announced him. He came in with the bright, alert 
air of a man ready for action for which he has appe- 
tite. His rarely heard laugh rang out, fresh and spon- 
taneous, several times during the interview. His man- 
ners were at all times those of a prince, but Mr. Gra- 
ham had never seen him so genial, so gay. The mantle 
of dreamer and poet had suddenly dropped from him, 
but the new mood had a charm all its own. 

When business had been dispatched and they sat on 
to finish their cigars, Mr. Graham reiterated his ex- 
pressions of pleasure in his visit of the evening before. 
" You gave me food for thought, Mr. Poe,'' said he. 
" I've been pondering on that creed of yours for find- 
ing and keeping the secret of true happiness. It is 
about the most wholesome and sane doctrine I've met 
with for some time. I've determined to adopt it, and 
to, at least endeavor, to practice it." 
His companion smiled. 

" Good ! " said he. I only hope you'll have better 
success in living up to it than I have." 

Mr. Graham's eyebrows went up. " I thought that 
was just what you did," was his answer. 



256 THE DREAMER 

" So it is^ at times ; but when the blues or the imp 
of the perverse get hold of me all my philosophy goes 
to the devil, and I realize what an arch humbug I 
am/' 

" The imp of the perverse ? " questioned Mr. Graham. 

" That is my name for the principle that lies hidden 
in weak human nature — the principle of antagonism 
to happiness, which, with unholy impishness, tempts 
man to his own destruction. Don't you think it an apt 
name ? " 

"I don't believe I follow you." 

'^ Then let me explain. Did you never, when stand- 
ing upon some high point, become conscious of an 
influence irresistibly urging you to cast yourself down? 
As you listened — fascinated and horrified — to the 
voice, did you not feel an almost overwhelming curi- 
osity to see what the sensations accompanying such a 
fall would be — to know the extremest terror of it? 
Your tempter was the Imp of the Perverse. 

" Did you never feel a sense of glee to find that some- 
thing you had said or done had shocked someone whose 
good opinion you should have desired? Did you never 
feel a desire to depart from a course you knew to be 
to your interest and follow one that would bring certain 
harm — possible disaster-— upon you? Did you never 
feel like breaking loose from all the restraints which 
you knew to be for your good — throwing off every 
shackle of propriety, and right, and decency? — Mr. 
Graham, did you never feel like throwing yourself to 
the devil for no reason at all other than the desire to 
be perverse? Could any desire be more impish? — I 
will illustrate by my own case. I am in one respect 
not like other men. An exceptionally high-strung ner- 



THE DREAMER 25'}' 

vous temperament makes alcoholic stimulants poison 
to me. It works like madness in my brain and in my 
blood. The glass of wine that you can take with 
pleasure and perhaps with benefit drives me wild — 
makes me commit all manner of reckless deeds that 
in my sane moments fill me with sorrow — and some- 
times produces physical illness followed by depression 
of spirits, horrible in the extreme. More — an inherited 
desire for stimulation and the exhilaration produced 
by wine, makes it well nigh impossible for me, once 
I have yielded my will so far as to take the single 
glass, to resist the second, which is more than apt to 
t)e followed by a third, and so on. I am fully aware 
therefore, of the danger that lies for me in a thing 
iiaimless to many men, and that my only safety and 
lii:ppine£S and the happiness of those far dearer to me 
than myself, lies in the strictest, most rigid abstinence. 
Knowing all this, one would suppose that I would fly 
from this temptation as it were the plague. I do gen- 
erally. At present, several years have passed since I 
yielded an inch. But there have been times — and 
there may be times again — when the Imp of the Per- 
verse will command me to drink and, fully aware of 
the risk, I will drink, and will go down into hell for a 
longer or shorter period afterward." 

During this lecture upon one of his favorite hob- 
bies, the low voice of The Dreamer was vibrant with 
earnestness. He spoke out of bitter experience and 
as he who bore the reputation of a reserved man, laid 
his soul bare, his vivid eyes held the eyes of his com- 
panion by the very intensity — the deep sincerity of 
their gaze. 

Mr. Graham's last conversation with his new editor 



.258 THE DREAMER 

had dazed him; this one dazed him still more. Wliat 
manner of man was this? (he asked himself) with 
whom he had formed a league? He could not say — 
beyond the fact that he was undoubtedly original — and 
interesting. Admirable qualities for an editor — both! 

The readers of the new monthly thoroughly agreed 
with him. The history of Edgar Poe^s career asi 
editor of The Southern Literary Messenger promptly 
began to repeat itself with Graham's Magazine. The 
announcement that he had been engaged as editor im- 
mediately drew the attention of the reading world 
toward Graham's, and it soon became apparent that 
in the new position he was going to out-do himself. 
The rapidity with which his brilliant and caustic criti- 
ques and essays^ and weird stories, followed upon the 
heels of one another was enough to take one's breath 
away. He alternately raised the hair of his readers 
with master-pieces of unearthly imaginings and diverted 
them with playful studies in autography and exhibitions 
of skill in reading secret writing. 

About the time of his beginning his duties at Gra- 
ham's he must needs have had a visit from some fairy 
godmother, the touch of whose enchanted wand left 
him with a new gift. This was a wonderfully devel- 
oped power of analysis which he found pleasure in 
exercising in every possible way. To quote his own 
words, " As the strong man exults in his physical 
ability, delighting in such exercises as bring his muscles 
into action, so glories the analyst in that moral activity 
which disentangles. He derives pleasure from even 
the most trivial occupations bringing his talent into 
play." 

He tried the newly discovered talent upon every- 



THE DREAMER 259 

thing. In his papers on " Autography " he practised 
it in the reading of character from hand-writing, and 
in his deciphering of secret writing he carried it so 
far and awakened the interest and curiosity of the 
public to such extent that it bade fair to be the ruin 
of him; for it seemed his correspondents would have 
him drop literature and devote himself and the col- 
umns of Graham's Magazine for the rest of his life, 
to the solving of these puzzles. Finally, having proved 
that it was impossible for any of them to compose a 
cypher he could not read in less time than its author 
had spent in inventing it, he took advantage of his 
only safeguard, and positively declined to have any- 
thing more to do with them. 

But he found a much more interesting way of exer- 
cising his power of analysis. In the April number of 
Graham's he tried it upon a story — "The Murders 
in the Eue Morgue" — which set all the world buz- 
zing, and drew the interested attention of France 
upon him. In the next number, while the " Murders " 
were still the talk of the hour, he made an excur- 
sion into the world of pseudo-SGience the result of 
which was his thrilling "Descent into the Mael- 
strom ; " but later in the same month he returned to 
his experiments in analysis — publishing in The Sat- 
urday Evening Post an advance review of Charles 
Dickens' story " Barnaby Rudge," which was just begin- 
ning to come out in serial form. In the review he 
predicted, correctly, the whole development and con- 
clusion of the story. It brought him a letter from 
Dickens, expressing astonishment, owning that the 
plot was correct, and enquiring if Edgar Poe had " deal- 
ings with the devil." 



260 THE DREAMER 

Soon followed the " Colloquy of Monos and Una/' 
in which in the exquisite prose poetry of which The 
Dreamer was a consummate master, his imagination 
sought to pierce the veil between this world and the 
nexti — to lay bare the secrets of the soul's passage into 
the "Valley of the Shadow." 

Whatever else Edgar Poe wrote, he continued to 
pour out through the editorial columns of Graham's 
Magazine a steady stream of criticism of current books. 
While entertaining or amusing the public as far as 
power to do so in him lay, he did not for a moment 
permit anything to come between him and the duties 
of his post as Defender of Purity of Style in Ameri- 
can Letters. He was unsparing in the use of his prun- 
ing hook upon the work of his contemporaries and the 
height of art to which by his fearless, candid and, at 
times, cruel criticism, he sought to bring others, he 
exacted of himself. In spite of the amount of work 
he produced, each sentence that dropped from his pen 
in this time of his maturity — his ripeness — was the 
perfection of clear and polished English. 

But the evidences of this conscientiousness in his 
own work did not make the little authors one whit 
less sore under his lash. Privately they writhed and 
they squirmed — publicly they denounced. All save 
one — an ex-preacher. Dr. Eufus Griswold — himself 
a critic of ability, who would like to have been, like 
The Dreamer, a poet as well as a critic. 

When Edgar Poe praised the prose writings of Dr. 
Griswold, but said he was " no poet," Dr. Griswold 
like the other little authors writhed and squirmed 
secretly — very secretly — but openly he smiled and in 



THE DREAMER 261 

smooth, easy words professed friendship for Mr. Poe — 
and bided his time. 

As for Poe himself, he had by close and devoted 
study of the rules which govern poetic and prose com- 
poisition — rules which he evolved for himself by 
analysis of the work of the masters — so added to his 
own natural gifts of imagination and power of expres- 
sion, so perfected his taste, that crude writing was dis- 
gusting to his literary palate. He had made Litera- 
ture his intellectual mistress, and from the day he 
had declared his allegiance to her he had served her 
faithfully — passionately — and he could brook no flag- 
ging service in others. 

Both his growing power of analysis and his highly 
developed artistic feeling were brought into full play 
in this review work. Under his guidance the writings 
of his contemporaries, whether they were the little 
authors or the giants such as, in England, Tennyson 
(who was a prime favorite with him), Macauley, Dick- 
ens, Elizabeth Barrett, or in America, Longfellow, 
Lowell, Hawthorne, Irving, Emerson, stood forth 
illumined — the weak spots laid bare, the strong points 
gleaming bright. 

He unfalteringly declared his admiration of Haw- 
thorne (then almost unknown) in which the future so 
fully justified him. The tales of Hawthorne, he 
declared, belonged to " the highest region of Art — an 
Art subservient to genius of a very lofty order.'^ 

Even the work of the little authors was indebted to 
him for many a good word, but the little authors hated 
him and returned the brilliant sallies his pungent pen 
directed toward their writings with vollics of mud aimed 
at his private character. 



262 THE DREAMER 

No matter what his subject, however, Edgar Poe al- 
ways wrote with power — with intensity. He seemed 
by turns to dip his pen into fire, into gall, into vitriol — 
at times into his own heart's blood. 

Of the last named type was the story " Eleonora," 
which appeared, not in Graham's, but in Tlie Gift for 
the new year, and wherein was set forth in phrases like 
strung jewels the story of the " Valley of the Many- 
Colored Grass." The whole fabric of this loveliest of 
his conceptions is like a web wrought in some fairy 
loom of bright strands of silk of every hue, and studded 
with fairest gems. In it is no hint of the gruesome, 
or the sombre — even though the Angel of Death is 
there. It is all pure beauty — a perfect flower from the 
fruitful tree of his genius at the height of its power. 

All of Edgar Poe's work gains much by being read 
aloud, for the eye alone cannot fully grasp the music 
that is in his prose as well as his verse. " Eleonora " 
was read aloud in every city and hamlet of the United 
States, and at firesides far from the beaten paths — 
the traveled roads — that led to the cities; for it was 
written when every word from the pen of Edgar Poe 
was looked for, waited for, with eager impatience, and 
when Graham's Magazine had been made in one little 
year, by his writing, and the writing of others whom 
he had induced to contribute to its pages, to lead 
the thought of the day in America. 

And the success of The Dreamer made him a lion 
in the " City of Brotherly Love " as it had made him 
a lion in Eichmond. The doors of the most exclusive — 
the most cultivated — homes of that fastidious city stood 
open to welcome him. The loveliest women, whether 
the grey ladies of the " Society of Friends '" or the 



TEE DREAMER 263 

brightly plumaged birds of the gayer world, smiled 
their sweetest upon him. As he walked along the streets 
passers-by would whisper to one another, 

^^ There goes Mr. Poe. Did you notice his eyes? 
They say he has the most expressive eyes in Philadel- 
phia.'^ 

Throughout this year of almost dazzling triumph the 
little cottage with its rose-hooded porch, in Spring 
Garden, had been a veritable snug harbor to The 
Dreamer. In winter when the deep, spotless snow lay 
round about it, in spring when the violets and hya- 
cinths came back to the garden-spot and the singing 
birds to the trees that overhung it, in summer when 
the climbing green rose was heavy with bloom and in 
autumn when the wind whistled around it, but there 
was a bright blaze upon the hearth inside, his heart 
turned joyously many times a day, and his feet at 
eventide, when his work at the office in the city was 
over, toward this sacred haven. 

And Edgar the Dreamer was happy. He should 
have been rich and would have been but for the meagre 
returns from literary work in his time. Men were 
then supposed to write for fame, and very little money 
was deemed sufficient reward for the best work. The 
poverty of authors was proverbial and to starve cheer- 
fully was supposed to be part of being one. 

Still, with his post as editor of Graham's and the 
frequency with which his signature was seen in other 
magazines, he was making a living. The howl of the 
wolf or his sickening scratching at the door were no 
more heard, and in the Valley of the Many-Colored 
Grass the three dreamers laughed together, and in the 



264 THE DREAMER 

streets of the ^' City of Brotherly Love " Edgar Good- 
fellow whistled a gay air, or arm in arm with some 
boon companion of the " Press gang " threaded his 
way in and out among of the human stream, with a 
smile on his lips and the light of gladness in living in 
his eyes. 

And why should he not be happy ? he asked himself. 
He had the snuggest little home in the world and, 
in it, the loveliest little wife in the world and the 
dearest mother in the world. He was upon the top of 
the wave of prosperity. His fame was growing — had 
already reached France, where " The Murders " were 
still being talked about. Why should he not be happy ? 
His devils had ceased to plague him this long while. 
The blues — he was becoming a stranger to them. The 
Imp — he had not had a single glimpse of him during 
the year. He was temperate — ah, therein lay man's 
safety and happiness ! By strict abstinence his capacity 
for enjoyment was exalted — purified. He would let 
the cup forever alone — upon that he was resolved ! 

This was not always easy. Sometimes it had been 
exceedingly hard and there had been a fierce battle 
between himself and the call that was in his blood — 
the thirst, not for the stuff itself, but for its effects, 
for the excitement, the exhilaration; but he had won 
every time and he felt stronger for the battle and for 
the victory — the victory of will. " Man doth not yield 
himself to the angels or to death utterly " (he quoted) 
"save only through the weakness of his feeble will." 
Upon continued resistence — continued victory — he was 
resolved, and in the resolution he was happy. 

Best of all, Virginia was happy, and " Muddie " — 
dear, patient " Muddie ! '' The two women chatted 



THE DREAMER 265 

like magpies over their sewing or house-work, or as 
they watered the flowers. They, like himself, had 
made friends. Neighbors dropped in to chat with them 
or to borrow a pattern, or to hear Yirginia sing. And 
they had had a long visit from the violet-eyed Eliza 
White. What a pleasure it had been to have the sweet, 
fair creature with them ! (He little guessed how tremu- 
lously happy the little Eliza had been to bask for a time 
in his presence^ — just to be near the great man — and 
meanwhile guard all the more diligently the secret that 
filled her white soul and kept her, for all her beauty 
and charm^ and her many suitors, a spinster). 

Eliza had brought them a great budget of Kich- 
mond news. It had been like a breath of spring to 
hear it. She talked and they listened and they all 
laughed together from pure joy. How Virginia's laugh 
had rippled out upon the air — it filled all the cottage 
with music ! 

It was mid-January, and he sat gazing into the rose- 
colored heart of the open coal fire going over it aU — 
the whole brilliant, full year. 

" Sissy," he said suddenly, " Do you remember the 
birthday parties I used to tell you about — that I had 
given me when I was a boy living with the Allans ? " 

"Yes, indeed! and the cake with candles on it and 
all your best friends to wish you many happy returns." 

"Well, you know the nineteenth will be my birth- 
day, and I want to have a party and a cake with 
candles and all our best friends here to wish you and 
me many happy returns of the happiest birthday we 
have spent together. I only wish old Cy were here to 
play for us to dance! I'd give something pretty to 
have him and his fiddle here, just to see what these 



266 THE DREAMER 

sober-sided Penn folk would think of them. My, 
wouldn't they make a sensation in the '^City of Brotherly 
Love !' '' He began whistling as clearly and correctly 
as a piccolo the air of a recently published waltz. 
After a few bars he sprang to his feet and — still whist- 
ling — quickly shoved the table and chairs to the wall, 
clearing the middle of the floor. The tune stopped 
long enough for him to say, 

'^Come, Sweetheart, you must dance this with me. 
My feet refuse to be still tonight ! " — then was taken 
up again. 

The beautiful girl was in his arms in an instant 
and while " Muddie,^' in her seat by the window, lifted 
her deep eyes from the work in her ever-busy hands 
and let them rest with a smile of indulgent bliss upon 
her '^'^ children,'' they glided round and round the room 
to the time of the fascinating new dance. 

At length they stopped, breathless and rosy, and the 
poet, with elaborate ceremony, handed his fair partner 
to a chair and began fanning her with " Muddie's " 
turkey-tail fan. He was in a glow of warmth and 
pleasure. His wonderful eyes shone like lamps. His 
pale cheeks were tinged with faint pink. While fan- 
ning Virginia with one hand he gently mopped the 
pleasant moisture from his brow with the other. Vir- 
ginia's eyes shot sunshine. Her laughter bubbled up 
like a well-spring of pure joy. 

" What would people say" if they could see the great 
Mr. Poe — the grand, gloomy and peculiar Mr. Poe — 
the author of ^Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque,' 
who's supposed to be continually ^dropping from his 
Condor wings invisible woe ?' " said she, as soon as she 
could speak. The idea was so vastly amusing to her 



TEE DREAMER 267 

that she laughed until the shining eyes were filled 
with dew. 

" If they could know half the pleasure I got out of 
that they wouldn't say anything/' he replied. " They 
would be dumb with envy. I suppose it's my mother in 
me, but I just must dance sometimes. And this waltz ! 
In spite of all the prudes say against it, it is the divinest 
thing in the way of motion that ever was invented. It's 
exercise fit for the gods ! " 

He drew her to him and kissed her eyes and her 
cheeks and her lips. 

'' It was heavenly— heavenly, Sis," said he, " And I 
don't suppose even the prudes could object to a man's 
waltzing with his own wife. I wonder will we ever 
dance to old Cy's fiddle again?" 



268 TEE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

It was a very modest party, but a merry one. The 
ground was covered with the unsullied whiteness of 
new-fallen snow and the coming of most of the guests 
was heralded by the tintinnabulation of the little silver 
bells so charming to the ear of the host. 

The Grahams were among the first to be welcomed 
out of the frosty night into the glow of lamp and 
candle and firelight, by the cordial hand and voice of 
Edgar Goodfellow. Mr. Graham was in tune to most 
heartily take part in the commemoration of the birth- 
day of the man who was making Graham's Mazagine 
the success of the publishing world in America. His 
kindling blue eyes had never been kinder, his smile 
never more bland. Mr. Alexander, founder of The 
Saturday Evening Post which so gladly published and 
paid for everything that Edgar Poe would spare it 
from Graham's was the next, and close following him, 
Mr. Cottrell Clarke, first editor of the Post, and hia 
charming wife. Captain and Mrs. Mayne Reid, who 
were among the most admiring and affectionate friends 
of the Poe trio were also there, and other congenial 
spirits. 

They came in twos and threes, their laughter as light 
and clear as the tinkle of their sleigh-bells. 

And Rufus Griswold was there. The Dreamer with 
his deep reverence for intellectual ability had a sincere 
admiration for Dr. Griswold — though he did say he 
was " no poet." He desired the approval — the friend- 



THE DREAMER 269 

ship — of this brainy man and was proud and happy 
to have him of his party. 

Coming in after the rest of the company had assem- 
bled, the brainy man's big frame, topped by his big 
head, with his prominent brow and piercing eyes, his 
straight, thick nose, his large full-lipped close-set 
mouth, his square jaw with the fringe of beard sharply 
outlining it, produced a decided effect. He seemed to 
fill up a surprisingly large portion of the room. Instinc- 
tively, the gentleman who had occupied the largest and 
heaviest chair vacated it and invited him to be seated 
in it — which he did, instinctively. He was a young 
man — under thirty — but looked much older. His 
face was a strange one. It could not have been called 
ugly. By some, indeed, it was considered handsome. 
It was strong, but it was strange. There was an inde- 
finable something unpleasant, something to awaken dis- 
trust — fear — about it. Across the dome of the brow 
ran, horizontally, a series of wavy furrows that pro- 
duced, in place of the benevolent air the lofty brow 
might have given, a sinister expression. The eyes be- 
neath the wrinkled brow were piercing and spoke of 
the fire of active mentality, but they were always down- 
east and turned slightly askance, so that few people 
caught the full force of their gleam, and there was 
sternness and coldness, as well as will, in the promi- 
nent chin and jaw. 

He came late, but he was a little more cordial in his 
expressions of pleasure in coming than any of those 
before him. His bows to Virginia and Mrs. Clemm 
were more profound — his estimation of Virginia's 
beauty he made at once apparent in the intense, admir- 
ing gaze he bestowed upon her. His words of congratu- 



270 THE DREAMER 

lation and good will for his host were more extravagant 
than those of any of the others and were uttered in a 
voice as smooth — as fluent — as oil; while he rubbed 
his large, fleshy hands together in a manner betokening 
cordiality. When his host spoke, he turned his ear to- 
ward him (though his eyes glanced aside and down- 
ward) with an air of marked attention, and agreed 
emphatically with his views or laughed uproariously at 
his pleasantries. 

Yet at Eufus Griswold^s heart jealousy was gnawing. 
Heaven had endowed him with mind to recognize 
genius, yet had denied him its possession. He that 
would have worn the laurel himself, was born to be 
but the trumpeter of others' victories. He, like Edgar 
Poe, had an open eye and ear for beauty — for har- 
mony. He could feel the divine fire of inspiration in 
the creations of master minds — yet he could not him- 
self create. He was a brilliant critic, but (as has been 
said) his ambition was to be, like Poe, also a poet. His 
quick intuition had divined the genius of Poe at their 
first meeting. He knew in a flash, that the neat, slen- 
der, polished gentleman, with the cameo face, the large 
brow and the luminous eyes, and with the deep-toned, 
vibrant voice, was one of the few he had ever met of 
whom he could say with assurance, " There goes a 
genius — " and of those few the topmost. Poe's writ- 
ing, especially his poetry, enthralled him. To have 
been able to come before the world as the author of sucli 
work he would have sold his soul. 

And this man who had caught him in a net woven 
of mingled fascination, and envy, and hate, had, oh, 
bitter! — while generously applauding him as a critic 
and reviewer — as a compiler and preserver of other 



THE DREAMER 271 

men's work— had added, " But— but — lie is no poet." 

He had received the stab without an apparent flinch. 
He had even laughed and declared that Mr. Poe was 
right. That he himself knew he was no poet — he did 
not aspire to be a real one, but only dropped into verse 
now and then by way of pastime. The lie had slipped 
easily from his tongue, but his eyes drooped ever so 
little more than usual as it did so, their shifty gleam 
glanced ever so little more sidewise. 

And though he came late to the birthday feast, his 
words of friendship were emphatic and the laugh that 
told of his pleasure in being there was loud and fre- 
quent. And he smiled and rubbed his hands together — 
and bided his time. 

And Edgar Poe was pleased — immensely pleased — 
on his gala night, with the complimentary manner and 
the complimentary words of this welcome guest — of 
this big, brainy man whose good opinion he so much 
desired. 

Alas, hapless Dreamer ! Did the gleam of those eyes 
cast alway slightly downward, slightly askance — give 
you no discomfort? Did the fang-like teeth when the 
thick lips opened to pour forth birthday wishes or 
streams of uproarious laughter, and the square lines of 
the jaw, suggest to your ready imagination no hint of 
cruelty ? If you could but have known that what time 
he laughed and talked with your guests and feasted at 
your board, with its tasty viands and its cake with 
lighted candles, and bent his furtive glance upon the 
beauty of your guileless Virginia — if you could but 
have known that in his black heart the canker jealousy 
was gnawing and that, behind the smile he wore as a 
mask, the brainy man was biding his time ! 



272 THE DREAMER 

It was a goodly little company — a coming together 
of bright wits and (for the most part) of kind hearts, 
and the talk was crisp, and fresh, and charming. 

Supper was served early. 

"My wife and her mother have thought that you 
Penn folk might like to sit down to a Virginia supper,'' 
said the host, as he led Mrs. Graham to the table, and 
stood for a moment while Virginia designated the seats 
to be taken. Then still standing, said, 

"Every man a priest to his own household, is our 
Virginia rule, but as we have with us tonight one who 
before he took up Letters wore the cloth, I'm going to 
abdicate in his favor. Dr. Griswold will you ask a 
blessing ? " 

All heads were bowed while the time-honored little 
ceremonial was performed, then seats were taken and 
the repast begun. 

Virginia presided over the "tea-things," while Mrs. 
Clemm occupied the seat nearest the door opening on 
the kitchen, that she might slip as unobtrusively as 
possible out and back again when necessary; but most 
of the serving was done by the guests themselves, each 
of whom helped the dish nearest his or her plate, and 
passed the plates from hand to hand. All of the sup- 
per, save the dessert and fresh supplies of hot waffles 
was on the table. There were oysters and turkey salad 
and Virginia ham. And there were hot rolls and " bat- 
ter-bread" (made of Virginia meal with plenty of 
butter, eggs and milk, and a spoonful of boiled rice 
stirred in) and there was a " Sally Lunn " — light, 
brown, and also hot, and plenty of waffles. In the little 
spaces between the more important dishes there were 
pickles and preserves — stuffed mangoes and preserved 



TEE DREAMER 273 

quinces and currant jelly. And in the centre of the 
table was the beautiful birthday cake frosted by Vir- 
ginians dainty fingers and brilliant with its thirty-three 
lighted candles. 

There was just enough room left for the three slender 
cut-glass decanters that were relics of Mother Clemm's 
better days. 

" The decanter before you, Mr. Graham, contains the 
Madeira; the Canary is before you, Captain Eeid, and 
I have here a beverage with which I am very much in 
love at present — apple wine — " Edgar Poe said, tap- 
ping the stopper of a decanter of cider near his plate. 

All undersood. He had served the cider that he 
might join with them in their pledges of friendship 
and good will without breaking through the rule of 
abstemiousness in which he was finding so much bene- 
fit. 

The toasts were clever as well as complimentary, 
and the table-talk light and sparkling. Finally both 
Mrs. Clemm and Virginia arose to clear the table for 
the dessert. 

"You see, my friends, we keep no maid or butler,'' 
said the host, " but I'm sure you will all agree with me 
in feeling that we would not exchange our two Hebes 
for any, and they take serving you as a privilege." 

The cake was cut and served with calves-foot jelly — 
quivering and ruby red — and velvety Ijlanc mange. 

After supper Virginia's harp was brought out of its 
corner and she sang to them. With adorable sweet- 
ness and simplicity she gave each one's favorite song 
as it was asked for — filling all the cottage with her 
pure sweet tones accompanied by the bell-like, rippling 
notes of the harp. The company sat entranced — all 



274 THE DREAMER 

eyes upon the lovely girl from whose throat poured the 
streams of melody. 

She seemed but a child ; for all she had been married 
six years she had but just passed out of her "teens" 
and might easily have been taken for a girl of fifteen. 
Her hair, it is true, was "tucked up/' but the inno- 
cence in the upturned, velvet eyes, the soft, childish 
outlines of the face, the dimpled hands and arms 
against the harp's glided strings, the simple little frock 
of white dimity, all combined to give her a " babyfied " 
look which was most appealing, and which her title of 
"Mrs. Poe" seemed rather to accentuate than other- 
wise. 

Kufus Griswold's furtive eye rested balefuUy upon 
her. And this exquitite being too, belonged to that 
man — as if the gods had not already given him enough ! 

From a far corner of the room her husband gazed 
upon her, and bathed his senses in contemplation of her 
beauty while his soul soared with her song. Mother 
Clemm noiselessly passing near him to snuff a candle 
on the table upon which his elbow, propping his head, 
rested, paused for a moment and laid a caressing hand 
upon his hair. He impulsively drew her down to a seat 
beside him. 

" Oh, Muddie, Muddie, look at her— look at her ! " 
he whispered. " There is no one anywhere so beautiful 
as my little wife ! And no voice like hers outside of 
Heaven! .... Ah — " 

What was the matter ? Was his Virginia ill ? Even 
as he spoke her voice broke upon the middle of a note — 
then stopped. One hand clutched the harp, the other 
flew to her throat from which came only an inarticulate 



THE DREAMER 275 

sound like a struggle for utterance. Terror was in the 
innocent eyes and the deathly white, baby face. 

:For a tense moment the little company of birthday 
guests sat rooted to their places with horror, then 
rushed in a mass toward the singer, but her husband 
was there first — his face like marble. His arms were 
around her but with a repetition of that inarticulate, 
gurgling sound she fell limp against his breast in a 
swoon. From the sweet lips where so lately only melody 
had been a tiny stream of blood oozed and trickled 
down and stained her pretty white dress. 

"Back! — All of you!'' commanded the low, clear 
voice of Edgar Poe, as with the dear burden still in 
his arms he sank gently to the floor and propping her 
head in his lap, disposed her limbs in comfortable, 
and her dress in orderly manner. "Back— don't 
crowd! A doctor! 

One of the guests from nearby, who knew the neigh- 
borhood, had already slipped from the door and gone to 
fetch the nearest doctor. The others sat and listened 
for his step in breathless stillness. 

Edgar Poe bent his marble face above the prostrate 
form of his wife, calling to her in endearing whispers 
while, with his handkerchief he wiped from her lips the 
oozing, crimson stream. His teeth chattered. Once 
before he had seen such a stream. It was long ago — 
long ago, but he remembered it well. He was back — 
a little boy, a mere baby — in the small, dark room 
behind Mrs. Eipps' millinery shop, in Richmond, and 
a stream like this came from the lips of his mother 
who lay so still, so white, upon the bed. And his 
mother had been dying. He had seen her thus — he 



276 TEE DREAMER 

would see her nevermore! Would the doctor 

never come? — 

Many days the Ange] of Death spread his wings over 
the cottage in the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. 
Their shadow cast a great stillness upon the cottage. 
Outside was a white, silent world. Snow had fallen — 
enow on snow — until it lay deep, deep upon the garden- 
spot and deep in the streets outside. There was no 
wind and the ice-sheathed trees that were as sentinels 
round about the cottage stood still. They seemed to 
listen and to wait. 

Inside, in the bed-chamber upstairs, under the shelv- 
ing walls of the low Dutch roof, The Dreamer's hearts- 
ease blossom lay broken and wan upon the white bed. 
It was a very white little blossom and the dark eyes 
seemed darker, larger than ever before as they looked 
out from the pale face. But they had never seemed so 
soft and a smile like an angel's played now and again 
about her lips. 

Beside her, with his lips pressed upon the tiny white 
hand which he held in both his own was the bowed 
figure of a man — of a poet and a lover who like the 
ice-sheathed trees seemed to listen and to wait — of a 
man whose countenance from being pale was become 
ghastly, whose eyes from being luminous were wild 
with a " divine despair." 

At the foot of the bed sat a silver-haired woman with 
saintlike face uplifted in resignation and aspiration. 
For once the busy hands were idle and were clasped 
in her lap. She too, listened and waited, as she had 
listened and waited for days. Oh Love ! Oh Life ! Are 



THE DREAMER 277 

these the happy trio who lived for each other only in 
the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass ? 

The silence was only broken when the lips of the 
invalid moved to murmur some loving words or to bab- 
ble of the flowers in the Valley. She was in no pain 
but she was very tired. She was not unhappy, for the 
two whom she loved and who loved her were with her 
and though she was tired she soon would rest — in 
Heaven. When she spoke of going the man's heart 
stood still with terror. He held the hand closer and 
pressed his lips more fiercely upon it. 

He would not let her go, he vowed. There was no 
power in Heaven or hell to whom he would yield her. 

But she sweetly plead that he would not try to de- 
tain her — that he would learn to bear the idea of her 
leaving him which now gave her no unhappiness but 
for one thought — the thought that after a season he 
might, in the love of some other maiden, forget the 
sweet life he had lived with her in the Valley, and that 
because of his forgetting, it would not be given to him 
to join her at last, in the land where she would be 
waiting for him — the land of Eest. 

At her words, he flung himself upon his knees beside 
her bed and offered up a vow to herself and to Heaven 
that he would never bind himself in marriage to any 
other daughter of earth, or in any way prove himself 
forgetful of her memory and her love, and to make the 
vow the stronger, he invoked a curse upon his head if he 
should ever prove false to his promise. 

And as she listened her soft eyes grew brighter and 
she, in turn, made a \ow to him that even after her 
departure she would watch over him in spirit and if it 
were permitted her, would return to him visibly in the 



278 THE DREAMER 

watches of the night, but if that were beyond her power, 
would at least give him frequent indications of her 
presence — sighing upon him in the evening winds or 
filling the air which he breathed with perfume from the 
censers of the angels. 

And she sighed as if a deadly burden had been lifted 
from her breast, and trembled and wept and vowed that 
her bed of death had been made easy by his vow. 

But it was not to be the bed of death. Little by little 
the shadow lifted from over the cottage — the shadow 
of the wings of the Angel of Death — and sunshine fell 
where the shadow had been, and a soft zephyr made 
music, that was like the music of the voice of " Ligeia/* 
in the trees which dropped their sheath of ice. And 
the snow disappeared from the streets and from the 
garden-spot which was all green underneath, and by the 
time the crocuses were up health and happiness reigned 
once more in the cottage. 

But it was a happiness with a difference. A happi- 
ness which for all it was so sweet, was tinctured with 
the bitter of remorse. 

During the illness of his beloved wife, Edgar Poe 
had lived over and over again through the horror of 
her death and burial with all of the details with which 
the circumstances of his life had so early made him 
familiar — and had tasted the desolation for him which 
must follow. While his soul had been overwhelmed with 
this supreme sorrow his mind had been unusually clear 
and alert. He had been alive to the slightest change in 
her condition. Anticipating her every whim, he had 
nursed her with the tenderness the untiring devotion, 



THE DKEAMER 279 

of a mother with her babe. Through all his grief he 
was quiet, self-possessed, efficient. 

But with the first glimmer of hope, his head reeled. 
His reason which had stood the shock of despair, or 
seemed to stand it, gave way before the return of happi- 
ness. A wild delirium possessed him. Joy drove him 
mad, and already drunk with joy — mad with it — he 
flung prudence, philosophy, resolutions to the wind and 
drank wine — and drank — and drank. When — where 
— how much — he did not know; but at last merciful 
illness overtook him and stopped him in his wild career. 

With his convalescence his right mind returned to 
him; but he felt as he did when he awoke to conscious- 
ness in Mother Clemm^s bed-chamber in Batlimore — 
that he had been down into the grave and back again. 
Only — then there was no remorse — no fiercely accusing 
conscience to make him wish from his soul that he 
might have remained in the abyss. 

In dressing-gown and slippers he sat — weak and 
tremulous — in an arm-chair drawn close to the open 
fire in the cottage sitting-room. About him hovered 
his two angels, anticipating his every need, pausing at 
his side now and again to bestow a delicate caress. Vir- 
ginia was more beautiful since her illness. Her face 
and figure had lost their plumpness and with it their 
childish curves — but a something exalted and ethereal 
had taken their place. Her eyes were softer, more wist- 
ful than ever. Through her fair, transparent skin 
glowed the faintest, most exquisite bloom. Her harp 
was mute. Her singing voice was gone. But the deep, 
low tones of her speaking voice, full of restrained feel- 
ing, could only be compared by her husband to the 



280 THE DREAMER 

melodious voice of the dream-woman, "Ligeia." They 
recalled to him the impression that the voice of the 
priest as he read the funeral rite over his dead mother 
had made upon his infant mind — the impression of 
spoken music. His Virginia could no longer sing, but 
every word that fell from her lips was music. 

As she and her tall, nun-like mother quietly stepped 
about the rooms ministering to his comfort, lifting the 
work of preparing the simple meals, mending the fire, 
and keeping the rooms bright into a sacred rite by the 
grace, the care, the dignity with which it was performed, 
no word, no look escaped either save of tenderness, pa- 
tience, and boundless love. All the reproaches came 
from within his own breast — from that inner self that 
boldly tearing the veil from his deeds filled him with 
loathing of himself. 

The years, his troubles, and his illness, had wrought 
a great change in him — outwardly. The dark ringlets 
that framed his face were still untouched with rime, 
and the dark grey eyes were as vivid, as ever-varying 
in expression as before, but the large brow wore a fur- 
row and over it and the clear-cut features and the 
emaciated cheeks was a settled pallor. The face was 
still very beautiful, but in repose it was melancholy and 
about the mouth there was a touch of bitterness. The 
illumining smile still flashed out at times, and filled all 
his countenance with sweetness and light — but it was 
rarer than formerly. 

He had many reasons for being happy — for being 
thankful. The genius with which he was conscious he 
was endowed in larger measure than others of his gen- 
eration was being recognized. He had fame — growing 
fame — and money enough for his needs. He had what 



TEE DREAMER 281 

was as necessary to his soul as meat was to his body — 
the love of a woman who understood him in all his 
moods and who was beautiful enough in mind and in 
body and pure enough in spirit for him to worship as 
well as to love — to satisfy his soul as well as his senses. 
And this woman, at the very moment when he thought 
himself about to lose her forever, had been given back 
to him — given back clothed upon with a finer a more 
exquisite beauty than she had possessed before. 

He had indeed found the end of the rainbow, but 
what did it amount to? He was dissatisfied — not 
with what life was giving him, but with what he was 
doing with his life. At the moment when his cup was 
fairly overflowing with happiness and he should have 
been strongest, he had suffered himself to be led away by 
the Imp of the Perverse, and had spoiled all. N'othing 
he had ever been made to taste he told himself, was so 
unbearably bitter as this dissatisfaction — this disgust 
with self. 

Yet when again the tiny crimson stream stained the 
sweet lips of his Virginia, and again the Angel of 
Death spread a dread wing for a season over the Valley 
of the Many-Colored Grass, all his knowledge of the 
bitterness — the loathing — of remorse was not sufficient 
to make him strong for the struggle with grief and 
despair. 

Again the reason of Edgar Poe gave way before the 
strain, and again he fell. 



282 TEE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

A day when the porch was rose-embowered once more 
and the garden-spot a riot of color and the birds singing 
in the trees round about, found Mr. Graham seated at 
Edgar Poe's desk in the office of Graham's Magazine. 
The door behind him opened, and he raised his head 
from his writing and quickly glanced over his shoulder. 
The look of inquiry in his blue eyes instantly kindled 
into one of welcome. 

^''Come in! Come in! Dr. Griswold," he ex- 
claimed. " I am more than glad to see you ! We are 
overwhelmed with work just now and perhaps we'll 
induce you to lend a hand." 

The visitor came forward with outstretched hand, 
stooping and bowing his huge bulk as he came in a 
manner that to a less artless mind than Mr. Graham's 
might have suggested a touch of the obsequious. His 
furtive but watchful eye had already marked the fact 
that it was at Mr. Poe's desk — not his own — that Mr. 
Graham sat — which was as he had anticipated. 

" Mr. Poe laid up again ? " he queried. 

^^Yes; he seems to be having quite an obstinate 
attack this time.'' 

The visitor sadly shook his head. " Ah ? — poor fel- 
low, poor fellow ! " 

" Do you think his condition serious ? " asked Mr. 
Graham, with anxiety. 

Dr. Griswold cast a glance of the furtive eye over his 
shoulder and around the room; then stooped nearer Mr. 
Graham. 



TEU DREAMER 283 

^^ Didn't you know ? " he questioned, in a lowered 
tone. 

" Only that the failure of his wife's health has been 
a sad blow to him and that after each of her attacks he 
has had a break-down. Is there anything more ? " 

Dr. Griswold stooped nearer still and brought his 
voice to a yet lower key. 

^^ Whiskey " — he whispered. 

Mr. Graham drew back and the candid brows went up. 

^^Ah — ah" he exclaimed. Then fell silent and 
serious. 

"Did you never suspect it?" asked his companion. 

"Never. I used to hear rumors when he was with 
Billy Burton, but I never saw any indications that they 
were true, and didn't believe them. How could I? 
Think of the work the man turns out — its quantity, 
its quality! He is at once the most brilliant and the 
most industrious man it has been my good fortune to 
meet — and withal the most perfect gentleman — ex- 
quisite in his manners and habits, and the soul of honor. 
Did you ever know a man addicted to drink to be so 
immaculately neat as he always is? Or so refined in 
manners and speech? Or so exact in his dealings? 
There is no one to whom I would more readily advance 
money, or with greater assurance that it will be faith- 
fully repaid in his best, most painstaking work — to 
the last penny ! " 

Dr. Griswold's face took on a look of deep concern. 

" The more's the pity — the more's the pity ! " said 
he. " A good man gone wrong ! " Then with a hesi- 
tating, somewhat diffident air. 

"You say that you need help which I might, per- 
haps, give?" 



284 . TEE DBEAMEB 

Mr. Graham was the energetic business man once 
more. Dr. Griswold's visit was most opportune, he said, 
for while he had on hand a good deal of " copy " for 
the next number of the magazine — furnished by Mr. 
Poe before his illness — there were one or two important 
reviews that must be written and Dr. Griswold would 
be the very man to write them, if he would. 

As Eufus Griswold seated himself at Edgar Poe's 
desk a look that was almost diabolic came into his face. 
The temporary substitution was but a step, he told him- 
self, to permanent succession. As editor of the maga- 
zine which under Poe's management had come to domi- 
nate thought in America, he could speak to an audience 
such as he had not had before. He could make or mar 
literary reputations and he could bring the public to 
recognize him as a poet ! 

It so chanced that upon that very day the editor of 
Oraham's Magazine found himself sufficiently recovered 
from his illness to go out for the first time. As he 
fared forth, gaunt and tremulous, the midsummer 
beauty of out-of-doors effected him curiously. It 
seemed strange to him that the rose on the porch 
should be so gay, that the sunshine should lie so golden 
upon the houses and in the streets of Spring Garden — 
that birds should be singing and the whole world going 
happily on when his heart held such black despair. As 
he went on, however, the fresh sweet air gave him a 
sense of physical well-being that buoyed his spirits in 
spite of the bitterness of his thoughts. 

He was going to work again, and he was glad of it — 
but he made no resolutions for the future. In the past 
when he had fallen and had braced himself up again, 
he had sworn to himself that he would be strong there- 



TEE DREAMER 285 

after — that he would never, never yield to the tempta- 
tion to touch wine again. But he had not been strong. 
And now he looked the deplorable truth straight in the 
face. He hoped with all his soul that he would not fall 
again. He would give everything he possessed to en- 
sure himself from yielding to the temptation to taste the 
wild exhilaration — the freedom — the f orgetf ulness — to 
say to the cup " !N"ev€rmore " — to ensure himself from 
having to pay the price of his yielding in the agony of 
remorse that was a descent into hell. 

But he would deceive himself with no lying pledges. 
He hoped — ^he longed to be strong; but he could not 
swear that h.e would be — he did not know whether he 
would be or not. The temptation was not upon him 
now — he loathed the very thought of it now; but the 
temptation would most certainly return sooner or later. 
He hoped from the bottom of his soul that he would 
resist it, but he feared — nay, in his secret heart he be- 
lieved — that he would yield. And because he believed 
it he loathed himself. 

As he drew near the oflSce he thought of Mr. Graham, 
— how kind he was — how trustful. He wondered if 
Mr. Graham knew the cause of his illnesses and if not 
how long it would before he would know it; and if 
the attacks were repeated how long he would be able to 
hold the place that had shown him the end of the rain- 
bow? How bitter it would be to some day find, added 
to all the other disastrous results of his weakness of 
will — to find another in the editorial chair of Gra- 
ham's. 

Just at this point in his soliliquy he reached his 
destination. He mounted the steps leading to the office 
of Graham's Magazine and opened the door — quietly. 



286 THE DREAMER 

For a moment the two men in the office — each deep 
in his own work — were unaware of his presence, and 
he stood staring upon their backs as they sat at their 
desks. Mr. Graham was in his accustomed seat and in 
his — The Dreamers — the giant frame of the man 
whose big brain he admired — though he was "no 
poet," — the frame of Ruf us Griswold ! 

Horror clutched his heart. Mr. Graham evidently 
knew, and knowing had supplied his place without 
deeming him worth the trouble of notifying, even. 
Had supplied it, moreover, with the one man who he 
himself believed would fill it with credit. The readers 
would be satisfied. He would not be missed. He 
turned and stumbled blindly down the stairs. Mr. 
Graham heard him, and hurrying to the door, recog- 
nized and followed him — trying to explain and to per- 
suade him to return. But he was too much excited to 
listen. His reason prompted him to listen, but the Imp 
of the Perverse laughed reason to scorn. Seeing dis- 
aster ahead he rushed headlong to embrace it. 

He understood — he understood, he reiterated. There 
was nothing to explain. Mr. Graham had secured Dr. 
Griswold's services. Mr. Graham had done well. No, 
not for any inducement would he consider returning. 

He was gone! He was in the street — a wanderer! 
A beggar, he told himself ! 

He wandered aimlessly about for an hour, then foot- 
sore — exhausted in mind and body — he turned his 
face wearily in the direction of Spring Garden, with 
its rose-embowered cottage sheltering exquisite beauty 
— unalterable love — unfailing forgiveness — heartsease. 
He must go home and tell " Muddie " and " Sissy " that 



TEE DREAMER 287 

he was a ruined man ! Oh, if they would only give him 
his desert for once ! If they would only punish him as 
he felt he should be punished. But they would not! 
They could not^ — for they were angels. They were 
more — they were loving women filled with that to 
which his mind and his soul bowed down and wor- 
shipped as reverently as they worshipped God in Heaven 
— woman's love, with its tenderness, its purity, and its 
unwavering steadfastness. They would suffer — that 
horrible fear, the fear of the Wolf at the door which 
they had not known in their beloved Spring Garden and 
since he had been with Graham's would again rob them 
of peace. They would bear it with meek endurance, but 
they would not be able to hide it from him. He would 
see it in the wistful eyes of Virginia and in the pa- 
tient eyes of " Muddie." But they would utter no re- 
proach. They would soothe him with winning endear- 
ments and bid him be of good cheer and would make 
a gallant fight to show him that they were perfectly 
happy. 

During the year and a half of Edgar Poe's connec- 
tion with Graham's Magazine he had raised the num- 
ber of subscribers from five thousand to thirty-seven 
thousand. His salary, like that he had received from 
The Messenger, had been a mere pittance for such ser- 
vice as he gave, but also, like what he received from The 
Messenger it had been a regular income — a depend- 
ence. With the addition of the little checks paid him 
for brilliant work in other periodicals, it had amply 
served, as has been said, to keep the Wolf from the door. 
In order to make as much without a regular salary it 



288 TEE DREAMER 

would be necessary for him to sell a great many articles 
and that they should be promptly paid for. And so he 
wrote, and wrote, and wrote, while " Muddie " took the 
little rolls of manuscript around and around seeking a 
market for them. Her stately figure and saintlike face 
became familiar at the doors of all the editors and pub- 
lishers in Philadelphia. 

It was a weary business but her strength and courage 
seemed never to flag. Sometimes she succeeded in sell- 
ing a story or a poem promptly and receiving prompt 
pay. Then there was joy in the rose-embowered cot- 
tage. Sometimes after placing an article payment was 
put off time and time again until hope deferred made 
sick the hearts of all three dwellers in the cottage. 

Oftentimes they were miserably poor — sometimes 
they were upon the verge of despair — yet through all 
there was an undercurrent of happiness that nothing 
could destroy — they had each other and even at the 
worst they still dreamed the dream of the Valley of 
the Many-Colored Grass, even though the heartsease 
blossom drooped and drooped. 

Virginia's attacks continued to come at intervals, and 
each time the shadow hung more persistently and with 
deeper gloom over the cottage. It would be lifted at 
length, but not until the husband and mother had suf- 
fered again all the agonies of parting — not until what 
they believed to be the last goodbyes had been said and 
the imagination, running ahead of the actual, had gone 
through each separate detail of death and burial. 

The Dreamer's thoughts dwelt constantly upon these 

scenes and details until finally the " dirges of his hope 

one melancholy burden bore — of Never^ — Nevermore.^' 

Under the influence of the state of mind that was 



TEE DREAMER 289 

thus induced, a new poem began to take shape in his 
brain — a poem of the death of a young and beautiful 
woman and the despair and grief of the lover left to 
mourn her in loneliness. As it wrote itself in his mind 
the word that had thrilled and charmed and frightened 
him at the bedside of his mother and to whose time his 
feet had so often marched, as to a measure — ^the mourn- 
ful, mellifluous word, N'evermore — became its refrain. 

The composition of his new poem became an obsession 
with him. His brain busied itself with its perfection 
automatically. Not only as he sat at his desk, pen in 
hand; frequently it happened that at these times the 
divine fire refused to kindle— though he blew and blew. 
But at other times, without effort on his part, the 
spark was struck, the flames flashed forth and ran 
through his thoughts like wild-fire. Wlien he was help- 
ing Virginia to water the flowers in the garden; when 
he walked the streets with dreaming eyes raised sky- 
ward, studying the clouds; when he sat with Virginia 
and the Mother under the evening lamp or with feet on 
the fender gazed into the heart of the red embers, or 
when he lay in his bed in the quiet and dark — wherever 
he was, whatever he did, the phrases and the rhythm of 
the new poem were filtering through his sub-conscious- 
ness, being polished and made perfect. 

Indeed the poem in the making cast a spell upon 
him and he passed his days and his nights as though 
in a trance. Virginia and Mother Clemm knew that 
he was in the throes of creation, and they respected his 
brown-study mood — stepping softly and talking little; 
but often by a silent pressure of his hand or a light kiss 
upon his brow, saying that they understood. They 
were happy, for they knew the state of mind that en- 



290 THE DREAMER 

veloped him to be one of profound happiness to him — 
though the brooding look that was often in his grey 
eyes told them that the visions he was seeing had to do 
with sorrow. They waited patiently, feeling certain 
that in due course would be laid before them a work 
in prose or verse, presenting in jewel-like word and 
phrase^ scenes in some strange, fascinating country 
which it would charm them to explore. 

At last it was done ! He told them while they sat 
at the evening meal. 

"I have something to read to you two critics after 
supper," he said. "A poem upon which I have been 
working. I don't know whether it is of any account or 
not.'' 

The two gentle critics were all interest. Virginia 
was breathless with enthusiasm and could hardly wait 
to finish her supper. 

"I knew you were doing something great," she ex- 
claimed. " I Jcnow it is great ! Nothing you have ever 
done has wrapped you up so completely. You've been 
in a beautiful trance for weeks and Muddie and I have 
been almost afraid to breathe for fear of waking you up 
too soon." 

As soon as supper was over he brought out one of 
the familiar narrow rolls of manuscript and smilingly 
drew it out for them to see its length — giving Virginia 
one end to hold while he held the other. 

She read aloud, in pondering tone, the two words that 
appeared at the top : ^^ The Eaven." — 

Then, as she let go the end she held, the manuscript 
coiled up as if it had been a spring, and the poet rolled 
it closely in his hands and with his eyes upon the fire, 
began, not to read, but slowly to recite. His voice 



THE DREAMER 291 

filled the roam with deep, sonorous melody, saving 
which there was no sound. 

When the last words, 

" And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating 
on the floor. 

Shall be lifted — nevermore!" 

had been said, there was a moment of tense silence. 
Then Virginia cast herself into his arms in a passion of 
tears. 

^^Oh, Eddie," she sobbed, "it is beautiful — beau- 
tiful ! But so sad ! I feel as I were the ^ost Lenore' 
and you the poor lover ; but when I leave you you must 
not break your heart like that. You and Muddie will 
have each other and soon you will come after me and 
we will all be happy together again — in Heaven ! " 

No word passed the lips of the mother. Her silvered 
head was bowed in grief and prayer. She too saw in 
"Lenore" her darling child, and she felt in anticipa- 
tion the loneliness and sorrow of her own heart. She 
spoke no word, but from her saintly eyes two large 
bright tears rolled down her patient cheeks upon the 
folded hands in her lap. 

And thus " The Eaven " was heard for the first time. 

Soon afterward it was recited again. Edgar Poe 
carried it himself to Mr. Graham and offered it for 
the magazine. Mr. Graham promised to examine it 
and give him an answer next day. That night he read 
it over several times, but for the life of him he could 
not make up his mind about it. Its weirdness, its 
music, its despair, affected him greatly. But Mr. Gra- 
ham was a business man and he doubted whether, from 



292 THE DREAMER 

a business point of view^ the poem was of value. Would 
pieople like it? Would it take? He would consult 
Griswold about it — Griswold was a man of safe judg- 
ment regarding such matters. 

Dr. Griswold was indeed, a man of literary judg- 
ment and of taste. The beauty of the poem startled 
him. It would bring to the genius of Edgar Poe (he 
said to himself) — the poetic genius — acknowledgment 
such as it had never had before. It was too good a 
poem to be published. He had bided his time and the 
hour of his revenge was come. He would have given 
his right hand to have been able to publish such a poem 
over his own signature — but the world must not know 
that Poe could write such an one ! 

The candid eyes of Mr. Graham as he awaited his 
opinion were upon his face. His own eyes wore their 
most furtive look — cast down and sidelong. His tone 
was depressed and full of pity as he said, 

" Poor Poe ! It is too bad that when he must be in 
need he cannot, or does not, write something saleable. 
Of course you could not set such stuff as this before the 
readers of Graham/ sT' 

For once Mr. Graham was disposed to question his 
opinion. 

" I don't know about that,'' he said. "^ The poem has 
a certain jpower, it seems to me. It might repel — it 
might fascinate. I should like to buy it just to give 
the poor fellow a little lift. The lovely eyes of that 
fragile wife of his haunt me." 

It was finally decided to let Mr. Poe read the poem to 
the office force, and take the vote upon it. 

They were all drawn up in a semi-circle, even the 
small office boy, who sat with solemn eyes and mouth 



TEE DBE'AMEB 293 

open and who felt the importance of being called uponj 
to sit in judgment upon a "piece of poetry/' Edgar) 
Poe stood opposite them and for the second time recited 
his new poem — then withdrew while the vote was taken. 

Dr. Griswold was the first to cast his vote and at once 
emphatically pronounced his " No ! " 

The rest agreed with him that the poem was "too 
queer/' but as a solace for the poet's disappointment 
some one passed around a hat and the next day a ham- 
per of delicacies was sent to Mrs. Poe, with the " com- 
pliments of the staff at Grahams/' 

Albeit " The Raven " was rejected by Graham's Maga- 
zine and others, enough of Edgar Poe's work was bought 
and published to keep his name and fame before the 
public — just enough (poorly paid as it was) to keep 
the souls of himself and his wife and his " more than 
mother/' within their bodies. 

And though Mr. Graham would none of " The 
Raven/' he paid its author fifty-two dollars for a new 
story — " The Gold Bug." This sum seemed a small 
fortune to The Dreamer at the time, but he was to do 
better than that with his story. The Dollar Magazine 
of New York offered a prize of one hundred dollars for 
the best short story submitted to it. Poe had nothing by 
him but some critical essays, but remembering his early 
success in Baltimore with "The MS. Found in a Bottle," 
he was anxious to try. So he hastened with the critiques 
to Graham/s and offered them in place of the story. 

Mr. Graham agreed to the exchange and " The Gold 
Bug" was promptly dispatched to New York, where it 
was awarded the prize. 

When it was published in The Dollar Magazine it 



294 THE DREAMER 

made a great noise in the world and a red-letter day in 
the life of Edgar Poe. 

The hundred dollars brought indeed, a season of com- 
fort and cheer in the midst of the hardest times the 
cottage in Spring Garden had known. But the last 
penny was finally spent. 

Winter came on — the winter of 1843. It was a 
severe winter to the cottage. The bow of promise 
that had spanned it seemed to have withdrawn to such 
a vast height above it that its outlines were indistinct — 
its colors well nigh faded out. 

The reading public still trumpeted the praise of 
Edgar the Dreamer — his friends still believed in him 
— from many quarters their letters and the letters of 
the great ones of the day fluttered to the cottage. 
And not only letters came, but the literati of the day 
in person — glad to sit at Edgar Poe's feet, their hearts 
glowing with the eloquence of his speech and aching 
as they recognized in the lovely eyes of the girl-wife 
" the light that beckons to the tomb." 

But tl\ere were other visitors that winter, and less 
welcome ones. Though the master of the cottage 
wrote and wrote, filling the New York and Philadelphia 
papers and magazines with a stream of translations, 
sketches, stories and critiques, for which he was some- 
times paid and sometimes not, the aggregate sum he 
received was pitifully small and the Wolf scratched at 
the door and the gaunt features of Cold and Want be- 
came familiar to the dwellers in the Valley of the Many- 
Colored Grass. 

In desperation the driven poet turned this way and 
that in a wild effort to provide the necessities of life 



TEE DREAMER 295 

for himself and those who were dearer to him than 
self — occasionally appearing upon the lecture platform, 
and finally attempting, but without success, to secure 
government office in Washington. 

And oftener and oftener, and for longer each time 
the Shadow rested upon the cottage — making the Val- 
ley dark and drear and dimming the colors of the grass 
and the flowers — the dread shadow of the wing of the 
Angel of Death. 

Even at such times The Dreamer made a manful 
struggle to coin his brains into gold — to bring to the 
cottage the comforts, the conveniences, the delicacies 
that the precious invalid should have had. An exceed- 
ingly appealing little invalid, she lay upon her bed 
in the upper chamber whose shelving ceiling almost 
touched her head; and sometimes "Muddie" and 
"Eddie'' fanned her and sometimes they chafed her 
hands and her feet and placed her pet, "Catalina," 
grown now to a large, comfortable cat, in her arms, 
that the warmth of the soft body and thick fur might 
comfort her shuddering frame. And oftentimes as 
she lay there " Eddie '' sat at a table nearby and wrote 
upon the long strips of paper which he rolled into the 
neat little rolls which he or " Muddie " took around to 
the editors. 

And sometimes the editors were glad to have them, 
and to pay little checks for them, and sometimes not. 

The truth was, that though the fame of Edgar Poe 
was well established, there was an undercurrent of 
opposition to him, that kept the price of his work down. 
The little authors — venomous with spite and jealousy 
— the little authors, chief among whom was Rufus 
Griswold of the furtive eye and deprecating voice, were 



296 TEB DREAMER 

sending forth little whispers defaming his character, 
exaggerating his weakness and damning his work with 
faint praise, or emphatic abuse. 

A day came when Edgar Poe realized that he must 
move on — ^that the '' City of Brotherly Love '' had had 
enough of him — that to remain must mean starva- 
tion. What removal would mean he did not know. 
That might mean starvation too, but, as least, he did 
not know it. 

It was hard to leave the rose-embowered cottage. 
It was April and about Spring Garden and the cottage 
the old old miracle of the renewal of iife was begun. 
The birds were nesting and the earliest flowers were 
in bloom. It was bitter to leave it — but, there was 
no money for the rent. His fame had been greatest in 
New York, of late. The New York papers had been 
the most hospitable to his work. It was bitter to leave 
Spring Garden, but perhaps somewhere about New 
York they would find another rose-embowered cottage. 
Virginia was unusually well for the present and the 
prospect of a change carried with it a possibility of 
prosperity. Who could tell what good fortune they 
might fall upon in New York ? 

Edgar Goodfellow had suddenly made his appear- 
ance for the first time in many moons. A change was 
the thing they all needed, he told himself. In change 
there was hope ! 

He placed Mother Clemm and " Catalina " tempo- 
rarily with some friends of the " City of Brotherly 
Love^^ who had invited them, and accompanied by his 
Virginia who was looking less was than for long past, 
fared forth, in the highest spirits, to seek, for the 
second time a home in New York. 



THE DREAMER 297 



CHAPTEE XXVIII. 

New York once more ! They went by rail to Amboy 
and the remaining forty miles by steamboat. 

Certain cities, like certain persons^ are witches ; they 
have power to cast a spell. New York is one of them. 

Edgar and Virginia Poe had known hard times in 
New York — the bitterness of hard times in a city 
large enough for each man to mind his own business 
and leave his neighbors to mind theirs. Yet as the 
boat slowed down and neared the wharf, and — past 
the shipping — they descried the houses and spires of 
town looming, ghostlike, through the enveloping mist 
of the soft, grey April day, it was with a thrill that 
these two standing hand in hand — like children — upon 
the deck, clasped each other's fingers with closer pres- 
sure and whispered, 

" New York once more ! " 

It was their first little journey in the world just 
together, just they two, and much as they loved the 
dear mother — their kind earthly Providence, as they 
laughingly called her — there was something very sweet 
about it. It was almost like a wedding journey. The 
star of hope which never deserted them for long, no 
matter what their disappointments and griefs might 
be, shone bright above their horizon — their beautiful 
faces reflected its light. By it the lines of care and 
bitterness seemed suddenly to have been smoothed out 
of Edgar's face, and under its influence Virginia's 
merry laugh rippled out upon the moist air, causing 
the eyes of her fellow-travellers to turn admiringly 
her way many times. 



298 TEE DREAMER 

Her husband hovered tenderly near her, drawing her 
shawl with solicitous hand closer about her shoulders 
and standing upon the windward side of her to protect 
her from the damp and keen breeze. He noted with 
delight the fresh color of her cheeks — the life and 
color in her eyes. 

'^ Do you know. Sweetheart," he said, " You have not 
coughed once since we left Philadelphia ! The change 
is doing you good already." 

Both were blythe as birds. As the boat tied up at 
the wharf a gentle shower set in, but it did not effect 
their spirits. He left her on board with some ladies 
whose acquaintance she had made during the journey, 
while he fared forth in the rain in quest of a boarding- 
house. As he stepped ashore he met a man selling 
se«ond-hand umbrellas. He bought quite a substantial 
one for sixty-two cents and went on his way rejoicing 
in the lucky meeting and the good bargain. 

In Greenwich Street he found what he sought — a 
genteel-looking house with " Boarders wanted," upon a 
card in the window. Another good bargain was made, 
and hailing a passing ^' hack " he hastened back to the 
boat for Virginia and her trunk and soon they were 
rattling over the cobblestones. 

"Why this is quite a mansion," exclaimed the little 
wife, as she peered out at the house before which the 
carriage stopped — for while the gentility of the estab- 
lishment was of the proverbial "shabby" variety, the 
brown-stone porch and pillars gave it an air of unmis- 
takable dignity. 

Not long after their arrival the supper-bell rang, 
and they found themselves responding with alacrity. 
iWhen they took the seats assigned them and their 



TEE DREAMER 299 

hungry eyes took in the feast spread before them, they 
squeezed each other's hands under the table — these 
romantic young lovers and dreamers. They had been 
happy in spite of frugality. Many a time while hunger 
gnawed they had kissed each other and vowed they 
wanted nothing (high Heaven pardoning the gallant 
lie!) Yet now, the traveller's appetite making their 
palates keen — the travellers weariness in their limbs — 
they were seized upon by an unblushing joy at finding 
themselves seated at an ample board with a kindly 
landlady at the head pouring tea — strong and hot— 
whose aroma was as the breath of roses in their nos- 
trels, while her portly and beaming spouse, at the foot, 
with blustering hospitality pressed the bounty of the 
table upon them. A bounteous table indeed, this de- 
cidedly cheap and somewhat shabby boarding-house 
spread, and to their eager appetites everything seemed 
delicious. 

There were wheat bread and rye bread, butter and 
cheese, cold country ham and cold spring veal — gen- 
erous slices of both, piled up like little mountains — and 
tea-cakes in like abundance. 

They feasted daintily — exquisitely, as they did every- 
thing, but they feasted heartily for the first time in 
months. 

After supper they went to their room — a spacious 
and comfortably, though plainly, furnished one, with 
a bright fire burning in a Jolly little stove. Their 
spirits knew no bounds. 

*^What would Catalina say to this solid comfort. 
Sis ? " queried Eddie. " I think she would faint for 

joy." 



300 THE DREAMER 

For answer Virginia smiled upon him through a 
mist of tears. 

"Why Virginia — my Heart — " he cried in amaze- 
ment. '"What is it?''" 

" Only that it is too beautiful ! " she managed to 
say. " And to think that Muddie and Catalina are not 
here to share it with us ! " 

"Just as soon as I can scrape together enough 
money to pay for Muddle's board and travelling ex- 
penses we will liave them with us/' he assured her. 

She dried her eyes and perched upon his knee while 
he went through his pockets and bringing out all the 
money he had, counted it into her palm. 

" Four dollars and a half/' he said. " Not much, 
but we are fortunate to have that. And with such fine 
living as we get here so cheap it will go quite a long 
way. Let me see — the price of board and lodging is 
only three and a half a week for both of us. Seven 
dollars would pay our way for a fortnight — and in a 
fortnight's time there's no telling what may turn up ! 
Some editor might buy ^ The Eaven,' or money due 
me for work already sold might come in. If I could 
only contrive to raise this sum to seven dollars we 
could rest easy for at least a fortnight." 

" I'll tell you how," said Virginia. " You have 
acquaintances here — hunt up some of them and borrow 
three dollars. Then you would have enough to pay two 
weeks board ahead and fifty cents over for pocket 
money." 

" Wise little head ! " exclaimed he, tapping her brow, 
" The very idea ! " 

And forthwith all care as to ways and means was 
thrown from both their minds, and they gave them- 



THE DREAMER 301 

selves up to an evening of enjoyment of the comforts 
of their brown-stone mansion. 

While Virginia was resting her husband went out 
for a little shopping to be done with part of the fifty 
cents they had allowed themselves for spending money. 
First he exchanged a few cents for a tin pan to be 
filled with water and placed on top of the stove, for 
the comfort of Virginia who had been oppressed by the 
dry heat. Then a few cents more went for two buttons 
his coat lacked, a skein of thread to sew them on with, 
and a skein of silk with which Virginia would mend a 
rent in his trousers made by too close contact with a 
nail on deck of the steamboat. 

Next day was a bright, beautiful, spring Sunday. 
The sky and budding trees had the newly-washed 
aspect often seen after a season of rain. The sound of 
church-bells was on the air; the streets were filled 
with people in their best clothes, and the new boarders 
in Greenwich Street, fortified with a breakfast of ham 
and eggs and coffee. Jubilantly joined that stream of 
humanity which flowed toward the point above which 
Trinity Church spire pierced the clear sky. 

On Monday, Edgar Poe was taken with what he 
called a "writing fit." For several days (during 
which Edgar Goodfellow remained in the ascendency) 
the fit remained on him, and he wrote incessantly — 
only pausing long enough, now and then, to read the 
result to Virginia. 

"This will earn us the money to bring Muddie and 
Catalina to New York," he said with confidence. 

At last the manuscript was finished and no sooner 
was the ink dry upon the paper than he took it to The 



TEE DREAMER 



Sun, which promptly bought and paid for it, and npon 
the next Sunday, April 13, printed it not as a story, 
but as news. 

''Astounding "News by Express, via I^orfolk! " (The 
headlines said). "The Atlantic crossed in Three Days." 
Signal Triumph of Mr. Monck Mason's Flying Ma- 
chines ! ! ! 

" Arrival at Sullivan's Island, near Charleston, S. C, 
of Mr. Mason, Mr. Robert Holland, Mr. Henson, Mr. 
Harrison Ainsworth, and four others, in the Steering 
Balloon, 'Victoria,' after a passage of seventy-five hours 
from Land to Land! Full Particulars of the Voy- 
age!^' 

Strange as it may seem, the " astounding news " was 
received by the people of New York for fact. There 
was a rush for copies of the Sun which announced with 
truth that it was the only paper in possession of the 
"news,^' and not until denial came from Charleston, 
several days later, was it suspected that the " news " 
was all a hoax and that Edgar Goodfellow was simply 
having a little fun at the expense of the public. 

The story did, indeed, earn money with which to 
bring " Muddie " and " Catalina " to New York. It 
did more — it brought the editors to Greenwich Street 
looking for manuscript. They begged for stories as 
clever and as sensational as " The Balloon Hoax," but 
in vain. Edgar Goodfellow had vanished and in his 
place was Edgar the Dreamer who only had to tell of, 

" A wild, weird clime that lieth sublime 
Out of Space— out of Time, 



Where the traveller meets aghast 
Sheeted Memories of the Past, — 



TEE DREAMER 303 

Shrouded forms that start and sigh 
As they pass the wanderer hy, — 
White-robed forms of friends long given 
In agony to the Earth and Heaven." 

It was in vain that the editors besought him to try 
something else in the vein of "The Balloon Hoax/^ 
assuring him that that was what his readers were ex- 
pecting of him, after his recent " hit '' — that was what 
they would be willing to pay him for — pay him well. 
Was it the Imp of the Perverse that caused him to 
positively decline, and to persist that " Dreamland '' 
was all he had to offer just then ? 

It was Mr. Graham who finally accepted this quaint 
and beautiful poem, and who published it — in the June 
number of Graham's Magazine. 

In October following the return of the Poes to l^ew 
York — October of the year 1844 — Mr. Nathaniel P. 
Willis who was then editor of The Evening Mirror, and 
had been editor of The Dollar Magazine, when it award- 
ed the prize of a hundred dollars to " The Gold Bug," 
was seated at his desk in the " Mirror '' office, when in 
response to his " Come in," a stranger appeared in his 
doorway — a woman — a lady in the best sense of a 
word almost become obsolete. A gentlewoman describes 
her best of all. She was a gentlewoman, then, past 
middle age, yet beautiful with the high type of beauty 
that only ripe years, beautifully lived, can bring — the 
beauty that compensates for the fading of the rose on 
cheek and lip, the dimming of the light in the eyes, for 
the frost on the brow — the beauty of patience, of ten- 
derness, of faith unquenchable by fire or flood of adver- 



304 THE DREAMER 

sity. A history was written on the face — a history in 
which there was plainly much of tragedy. Yet not 
one bitter line was there. 

It was a face, withal, which could only have be- 
longed to a mother, and might well have belonged to 
the mother, Niobe. 

In figure she was tall and stately, with a gentle dig- 
nity. Her dress was simple to plainness, and might 
have been called shabby had it been less beautifully 
neat. It was of unrelieved black, and she wore a con- 
ventional widow's bonnet, with floating white strings. 

The reader needs no introduction to this stranger to 
Mr. Willis, who in a gentle, well-bred voice, with a cer- 
tain mournful cadence in it, announced herself as ^^ Mrs. 
Clemm — the mother-in-law of Mr. Poe." 

No connection with a famous author was needed to 
inspire Mr. Willis with respect for his visitor. She 
seemed to him to be an " angel upon earth," and it 
was with an air approaching reverence that he handed 
her to the most comfortable chair the office afforded. 

Her errand was quickly made known. Edgar Poe 
was ill and not able to come out himself. His wife was 
an invalid, and so it devolved upon her to seek em- 
ployment for him. In spite of his fame, she said, and 
of his industry, his manuscripts brought him so little 
money that he was in need of the necessities of life. 
Eegular work with a regular income, however small, she 
felt to be his only hope of being able to rise above 
want. 

Mr. Willis was distressed and promptly offered all 
he could. It was not much, but it was better than 
nothing — it was the place of assistant editor of his 
paper. 



THE DREAMER 305 

For months following, the figure of Edgar Poe was 
a familiar one in the office of the Evening Mirror. 
Neither in his character of Edgar the Dreamer nor that 
of Edgar Goodfellow was he especially known there, 
but simply as a modest, industrious sub-editor, doing 
the work of a mechanical paragraphist as quietly, as 
unobtrusively, as a machine. With rarely a smile and 
rarely a word, he stood from morning till night at his 
desk in a corner of the editorial room — pale, still and 
beautiful as a statue, punctual and efficient and the 
embodiment of courtesy always. 

And quietly and unobtrusively his personality made 
itself felt. Mr. Willis came to love him for his innate 
charm and for his faithfulness to duty. 

But the desk of a sub-editor could not long hold a 
genius like Edgar Poe. He bore its drudgery without 
complaint, but when an opening that seemed to invite 
his ambition, as well as to promise better pay came, 
he hailed it with enthusiasm. In March of the next 
year he formed a partnership with two New York 
journalists, as editors and managers of The Broadway 
Journal. A few months later saw him sole proprietor 
as well as editor, and for a short, bright period his old 
dream of a magazine of his own, in which he could 
write as he pleased, came true. Its realization seemed 
to inspire him with new energy. How many heads, 
how many right hands had the man — his readers 
asked each other — that he could turn out such a mass 
of work of such high order? His own and many other 
of the magazines of the day were filled with reviews 
and criticisms that made him the terror of other writ- 



306 THE DREAMER 

ers, and with stories and poems that made him the mar- 
vel of readers everywhere. 

His works were translated into the tongues of 
J^anee, Germany and Spain, and his fame grew in 
all of those countries. 

Yet the most that he could afford in the way of a 
home was up two flights of stairs — two rooms in the 
third story of a dingy old house in East Broadway. 
Mother Clemm and Virginia kept them bright and 
spotless and " Catalina " dosing on the hearth gave a 
final touch of comfort, and they were far above the 
noise and dust of the streets, with windows opening 
upon a goodly view of the sky. They had a front and 
a back room, so that the beauties of the dawn and 
the noontide — of sunset and moonrise — were all theirs. 

And the Wolf came not near the door, and the three 
whose natures were like to the natures of the oak, the 
vine and the heartsease, and who lived for each other 
only, dreamed again the dream of the wonderful val- 
ley — the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. 



TEE DREAMER 307 



CHAPTER XXIX. 



Up, up the stairs, two steps at a time, sprang The 
Dreamer, one white January day, and burst in upon 
Mother Clemm who was preparing dinner, and Vir- 
ginia was was mending his coat. He was in a great 
glee. He caught " Muddie '^ in his arms where she 
etood with her hands deep in a tray of dough, and 
kissed her, then stooped over Virginia and kissed her, 
and dropped into her lap a crisp ten dollar bank note. 
She gave a little scream of delight. 

" Where did you get it ? " she cried ? 

"From Willis. I've sold him The Raven,' He's 
vastly taken with it and not only paid me the ten, in 
advance, but will give the poem an editorial puff in the 
Mirror of the nineteenth. He showed me a rough 
draft. He will say that it is 'the most effective ex- 
ample of fugitive poetry ever published in this country,' 
and predict that it will 'stick in the memory of every- 
body who reads it P " 

" And it will ! It will ! " cried Virginia. " Espe- 
cially that 'N"ievermore.' I've done everything in time 
to it since the first night you read it to us." 

" I've done everything in time to it since I was 
three years old," murmured her husband. He drew the 
miniature from the inside pocket of his coat where he 
had carried it, close against his heart, throughout his 
life, and gazed long upon it. In his grey eyes was the 
tender, brooding expression which the picture always 
called forth. " Ever since I heard that word for the 
first time from the lips of my old nurse when she took 



308 THE DREAMER 

me in to see my mother robed for the grave, my feet 
and my thoughts have kept time to it; and generally 
when my steps and my face have been set toward hope 
and happiness it has risen before me like a wall, block- 
ing my way." 

Virginia arose from her chair letting her work and 
the bank note fall unheeded from her lap, and went to 
him. Gently taking the miniature from his hands she 
restored it to its place in his pocket and then with a 
hand on each of his shoulders lifted her eyes to his. 

" Buddie," she said, calling him by the old pet name 
of their earliest days, " You frighten me sometimes. 
The miniature is beautiful but it makes you so sad. 
And when you talk that way about ^The Eaven/ I feel 
as if I could hear your tears dropping on my coffin- 
lid ! " Then, with a sudden change of mood, her laugh 
rang out, and she pressed her lips upon his. 

"I'll have you know," she said, "I'm not dead yet, 
and you will not have to journey to any 'distant Aidenn' 
to ^clasp' me." 

" No, thank God ! " he breathed, crushing her to him. 

It was upon January 39, 184-5, that " The Eaven " 
appeared, with Willis's introductory puff. In spite of 
Dr. Griswold and the staff of Graham's Magazine, it 
created an instant furor. It was published and re- 
published upon both sides of the Atlantic. To quote a 
contemporary writer, everybody was " raven-mad " 
about it, except a few " waspish foes " who would do 
its author " more good than harm." 

It brought to the two bright rooms up the two flights 
of stairs visitors by the score, eager to congratulate 
the poet, to make the acquaintance of his interesting 



THE DREAMER 309 

wife and mother and to assure all three of their wel- 
come to homes approached by brown-stone steps. 

And it brought letters by the score — some from the 
other side of the Atlantic. Among these was one from 
Miss Elizabeth Barrett, soon to become the mfe of Mr. 
Eobert Browning. 

^^Your ^Raven' has produced a sensation here in 
England," she wrote. " Some of my friends are taken 
by the fear of it, and some by its music. I hear of 
persons haunted by the ^Nevermore/ and one of my 
friends who has the misfortune of possessing a bust of 
Pallas never can bear to look at it in the twilight. Mr. 
Browning is much struck by the rhythm of the poem. 

'' Then there is that tale of yours, ^The Case of M. 
Valdemar,' throwing us all into a *^most admired dis- 
order,' and dreadful doubts as to whether ^it can be 
true,' as children say of ghost stories. The certain 
thing in the tale in question is the power of the writer 
and the faculty he has of making horrible improba- 
bilities seem near and familiar." 

Of all the letters from far and near, this was the 
one that gave The Dreamer most pleasure, and as for 
Virginia and the Mother, they read it until they knew 
it by heart. 

When, some months later, his new book, " The Kaven 
and Other Poems," came out, its dedication was, "To 
the noblest of her sex — Miss Elizabeth Barrett, of Eng- 
land." 

And there was joy in the two rooms up two flights 
of stairs where Edgar Poe sat at his desk reeling off 
his narrow little strips of manuscript by the yard. 



310 THE DREAMER 

His work filled The Broadway Journal and overflowed 
into many other periodicals. 

While he created stories and poems, he gave more 
attention than ever to the duties of his cherished post 
as Defender of Purity of Style for American Letters, 
and the fame to which he had risen giving him new 
authority, he made or marred the reputation of many a 
literary aspirant. 

Exposition of plagiarism became a hobby with him, 
and his attacks upon Longfellow upon this ground, 
brought on a controversy between him and the gentle 
poet which reached such a heat that it was dubbed 
"The Longfellow War." All attempts of friends and 
fellow journalists to make him more moderate in his 
criticisms were in vain; they seemed indeed, but to 
excite the Imp of the Perverse, under whose influence 
he became more merciless than ever. An admirer of 
this virtue carried to such an extreme that it became 
a serious fault, as it was assuredly a grievous mistake, 
humorously characterized him in a parody upon " The 
Raven," containing the following stanza: 

" Neither rank nor station heeding, with his foes around 

him bleeding. 
Sternly, singly and alone, his course he kept upon that 

floor; 
While the countless foes attacking, neither strength nor 

valor lacking. 
On his goodly armor hacking, wrought no change his 

visage o'er. 
As with high and honest aim he still his falchir. ■ 

proudly bore. 
Resisting error evermore." 



THE DREAMER 311 

Many of the " waspish foes " thus made turned their 
stings upon his private character, against which there 
was already a secret poison working — the poison that 
fell from the tongue, and the pen of Rufus Griswold. 
He had the ear of numbers of Edgar Poe's friends in 
the literary world, and what time The Dreamer dreamed 
his dreams in utter ignorance of the unfriendliness 
toward him of the big man whose big brain he admired, 
the big man watched for his chance to insert the 
poison. It was invariably hidden in a coating of sugar. 
Poe was a wonderful genius, he would declare, his 
imagination — his style — they were marvellous! Mar- 
velous! His Jiead was all right, but — . The "but"' 
always came in a lowered tone, full of commiseration, 
'^lut — his heart! — Allowance should, of course, be 
made for his innate lack of principle — he should not 
be held too responsible. His habits — well known to 
everyone of course ! " 

No — they were not even suspected, many of his lis- 
teners replied. Might not Dr. Griswold be mistaken? 
they asked. Was it possible that an habitual drunkard 
could turn out such a mass of brilliant and artistic 
work ? And consider the exquisite neatness of his manu- 
script ! 

Peradventure the listener persisted in believing his 
informant mistaken — peradventure he at once accepted 
the damaging statements; but in every case the poison 
had been administered, and was at work. 

There was just one class among the writers of the 
day sacred from the attacks of Edgar Poe's pen. Before 
almost everything else The Dreamer was chivalrous. 
The ^^ starry sisterhood of poetesses" and authoresses, 



312 THE DREAMER 

therefore, escaped his criticisms. One of his contem- 
poraries said of him that he sometimes mistook his vial 
of prussic acid for his ink-pot. In writing of authors 
of the gentle sex, his ink-pot became a pot of honey. 

Several of these literary ladies living in New York 
had their salons, where they received, upon regular 
days, their brothers and sisters of the pen, and at which 
The Dreamer became a familiar figure. 

'^ I meet Mr. Poe very often at the receptions," gos- 
siped one of the fair poetesses in a letter to a friend in 
the country. " He is the observed of all observers. His 
stories are thought wonderful and to hear him repeat 
'The Eaven' is an event in one's life. People seem to 
think there is something uncanny about him, and the 
strangest stories are told and what is more, believed, 
about his mesmeric experiences — at the mention of 
which he always smiles. His smile is captivating! 
Everybody wants to know him, but only a few people 
seem to get well acquainted with him." 

Chief among the salons of New York was that of 
Miss Anne Charlotte Lynch — who was afterward Mrs. 
Botta. An entre to her home was the most-to-be-de- 
sired social achievement New York could offer, for 
it meant not only to know the very charming lady her- 
self, but to meet her friends ; and she had drawn around 
her a circle made up of the persons and personages- 
men and women — best worth knowing. She became 
one of The Dreamer's most intimate friends, and always 
made him and his wife welcome at her " evenings." It 
was not long after " The Eaven " had set the town 
marching to the word " nevermore," that he made his 
first visit there — a visit which long stood out clear in 
the memories of all present. 



THE DREAMER 313 

In the cavernous chimney a huge grate full of glow- 
ing coals threw a ruddy warmth into Miss Lynch's 
spacious drawing-room. Waxen tapers in silver and in 
crystal candelabra, and in sconces, filled the apartment 
with a blaze of soft light, lit up the sparkling eyes and 
bright, intellectual faces of the assembled company, and 
showed to advantage the jewels and laces of the ladies 
and the broadcloth of the gentlemen. 

Miss Lynch stood at one end of the room between 
the richly curtained windows and immediately in front 
of a narrow, gold-framed mirror which reached from 
the frescoed ceiling to the floor and reflected her 
gracious figure to advantage. She was listening with 
interested attention to Mr. Gillespie, the noted mathe- 
matician, whose talk was worth hearing in spite of the 
fact that he stammered badly. His subject tonight 
happened to be the versatility of " Mr. P-P-Poe.'' 

"He might have been an eminent m-m-mathemati- 
cian if he had not elected to be an eminent p-p-poet," 
he was saying. 

To her right Mr. Willis's daughter, Imogen, was 
flirting with a tall, lanky young man with sentimental 
eyes, a drooping moustache and thick, straight, longish 
hair, whose lately published ballad, "Oh, Don't You 
Eemember Sweet Alice, Ben Bolt?" was all the rage. 

To her left the Minerva-like Miss Margaret Fuller 
whose critical papers in the New York Tribune were 
being widely read and discussed, was amiably quarrel- 
ing with Mr. Horace Greely, and upon a sofa not far 
away Mr. William Gilmore Simms, the novelist and 
poet, was gently disagreeing with Mrs. Elizabeth Oakes 
Smith in her contention for Woman's Eights. 

At the opposite end of the room a lovely woman in 
a Chippendale chair was the central figure of a group 



314 THE DREAMER 

of ladies and gentlemen each of whom hung upon her 
least word with an interest amounting to affection. 
She was a woman who looked like a girl, for thirty 
years had been kind to her. Glossy brown hair parted 
in the middle and brushed smoothly down in loops 
that nearly covered her ears framed an oval face, with 
delicate, clear-cut features, pale complexion and eyes as 
brown and melting as a gazelle's. 

She was none other than Mrs. Frances Osgood, the 
author, or authoress, as she would have styled herself, 
of " The Poetry of Flowers " — so much admired by 
her contemporaries — whose husband, Mr. S. S. Osgood, 
the well known artist, had won her heart while painting 
her portrait. 

Conspicuous in the group of literary lights surround- 
ing her was Dr. Griswold in whose furtive glance, had 
she been less free from guile, she might have read an 
admiration fiercer than that of friendship or even of 
platonic love, and to whose fires she had unwittingly 
added fuel by expressing admiration for his poems — 
Mr. Poe's opinion to the contrary. 

Mr. Locke, author of "The Moon Hoax," was of 
the group; and the Eeverend Ealph Hoyt, who was a 
poet as well as a preacher ; and Mr. Hart, the sculptor ; 
and James Eussell Lowell, who happened to be in town 
for a few days; and Mr. Willis and his new wife; and 
Mrs. Embury whose volume of verse, "Love's Token 
Flowers," was just out and being warmly praised; and 
George P. Morris, Willis's partner in the Mirror, whose 
" Woodman, Spare that Tree ! " and " We were Boys 
Together," had (touching a human chord) made him 
popular. 

The beloved physician. Dr. Francis, seemed to be 
everywhere at once, as he moved about from group to 



TEE DREAMER 315 

group with a kindly word for everybody — the candle- 
light falling softly upon his flowing silver locks and 
his beaming, ruddy countenance. 

Suddenly, there was a slight stir in the room — a 
cessation of talk — ■ a turning toward one point. 

"There is Mr. P-P-Poe now/' said Mr. Gillespie to 
Miss Lynch, and followed her as, with out-stretched 
hand and cordial smile, she hastened toward the door 
where stood the trim, erect, black-clad figure of Edgar 
Poe, with his prominent brow and his big dreamy eyes, 
and his wife, pale as a snow-drop after her many ill- 
nesses, and as lovely as one, and still looking like a 
child, upon his arm. 

Instant pleasure and welcome were written upon 
every face present save one, and even that quickly as- 
sumed a smile as its owner came forward bowing and 
stooping in an excess of courtesy. 

The pair became immediately the centre of attrac- 
tion. Everybody wanted to have a word with them. It 
made Virginia thoroughly happy to see " Eddie " appre- 
ciated, and she chatted blythely and freshly with all — 
her spontaneous laugh bearing testimony to her enjoy- 
ment — while The Dreamer yielded himself with his 
wonted modesty and grace to the hour — answering 
questions as to whether he j^eally did believe in ghosts 
and whether the experiments in mesmerism in his story, 
"The Case of M. Yaldemar" had anij foundation in 
fact, with his captivating but enigmatic smile, and a 
little Frenchified shrug of the shoulders. 

It would have seemed at first that he had diverted at- 
tention from the fair author of "The Poetry of Flow- 
ers '' to himself, but erelong — no one knew just how it 
came to pass — Edgar Poe was sitting upon an ottoman 
drawn close to the Chippendale chair, and the two lions 



316 THE DREAMER 

were deep in earnest and intimate conversation upon 
which no one else dared intrude. The furtive eye of 
Eufus Griswold marked well the evident attraction be- 
tween these two beautiful and gifted beings — poets — 
and something like murder awoke in his heart. 

The tete-a-tete was interrupted by Miss Lynch, who 
declared that she voiced the wish of all present in re- 
questing that Mr. Poe would recite " The Eaven." 

All the candles save enough to make (with the fire's 
glow) a dim twilight^ were put out, and the poet took 
his stand at one end of the long room. 

A hush fell upon the company and in a quiet, clear, 
musical voice, he began the familiar words. 

There was scarcely a gesture — just the motionless 
figure, the pale, classic face, which was dim in the half- 
light, and the deep, rich voice. 

Miss Lynch was the first to break the silence follow- 
ing the final " Wevermore.^^ Moving toward him with 
her easy, distinguished step, she thanked him in a few 
low-spoken words. Mrs. Osgood, rising gracefully from 
her chair, followed her example, with Dr. Griswold at 
her heels, and in a few moments more the whole room 
was in an awed and subdued hum. 

The girl-wife came in for her share of the lionizing. 
Her appearance was in marked contrast to that of the 
richly apparelled women about her. The simplest dress 
was the only kind within her reach — for which she 
may have consoled herself with the thought that it was 
the kind that most adorned her. She wore tonight a 
little frock made by her own fingers, of some crimson 
woolen stuff, without a vestige of ornament save a bit 
of lace, yellow with age, at the throat. Her hair was 
parted above the placid brow, looped over her ears and 
twisted in a loose knot at the back of her head, in the 



THE DREAMER 317 

prevailing fashion for a young matron ; which with her 
youthful face, gave her a most quaint and charming 
appearance. 

Her husband's coat had seen long service, but it was 
neatly brushed and darned, and the ability to wear 
threadbare clothing with distinction was not the least of 
Edgar Poe's talents. Beside his worn, but cared-for 
apparel, costly dress often seemed tawdry. 

Out from the warmth and the light and the perfume 
and the luxury and the praise of the beautiful drawing- 
room with its distinguished assemblage, — out into the 
streets of Niew York — into the bleakness and the dark- 
ness of the winter's night — stepped Edgar Poe and his 
wife. Virginia was wrapped against the cold in a 
Paisley shawl that had been one of Mother Clemm's 
bridal presents, while Edgar wore the military cape he 
had at West Point and which, except in times of un- 
usual prosperity, had served him as a great-coat ever 
since. 

Through the dimly-lit streets, slippery with ice, and 
wind-swept, they made their way to the two rooms up 
two flights of stairs, where the Widow Clemm mended 
the fire with a few coals at a time and sewed by a single 
candle, as she waited for them — the lion of the most 
distinguished circle in America and his beautiful wife? 

Back from a world of dreams created by a company 
of dreamers to the reality of an empty larder and a low 
fuel pile and a dun from the landlord from whom they 
rented the two rooms. 

" The Eaven " had brought its author laurels in 
abundance, but only ten dollars in money. Editors 
were clamoring for his work and he was supplying it 
as fast as one brain and one right hand could; and 



318 THE DREAMER 

some of them were sending their little checks promptly 
in return and some were promising little checks some 
day; but The Broadway Journal had failed for lack of 
capital. It was the old story. He had no regular in- 
come and the irregularly appearing little checks only 
provided a from-hand-to-mouth sort of living for the 
three. 

Yet they had their dreams. Landlords might turn 
them out of house and home but they were powerless to 
deprive them of their dreams. 

Mother Clemm's one candle was burning low — its 
light and that of the dying fire barely relieved the 
room from darkness and did not prevent the rays of 
the newly arisen full moon from coming through the 
lattice and pouring a heap of silver upon the bare floor. 

" Look Muddie ! Look Sissy ! " cried the poet. " If 
we lived in a blaze of light, like your rich folk, we 
should have to go out of doors to see the moon. Who 
says there are not compensations in this life?" 



THE DREAMER 319 



CHAPTEE XXX. 



But it was not always possible to take a hopeful 
view. Continued poverty which oftentimes reached the 
degree of positive want, anxiety for Virginia's health 
and inability to provide for her the remedies and com- 
forts he felt might preserve her life, were enough to 
arouse Edgar Poe's blue devils, and they did. 

Why detail the harassments of the rest of that winter, 
during which The Dreamer led a strange double life — 
a life in the public eye of distinction, prosperity, popu- 
larity, but in private, a hunted life — a life of constant 
dread of the wrath of a too long indulgent landlord or 
grocer — a flitting from one cheap lodgement to another. 

One gleam of genuine sunshine brightened the dreary 
days. The acquaintance with Prances Osgood begun at 
Miss Lynch's salon soon ripened into close friendship. 
She found her way up the two flights of stairs and 
Edgar and Virginia and the Mother received her with 
as ready courtesy and welcome as though the two rooms 
that looked on the sky had been a palace. Her intimacy 
became so complete — her understanding of, and sym- 
pathy with, the three who lived for each other only so 
perfect that it was almost as if she had been admitted 
to the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. 

Upon her The Dreamer bestowed in abundant meas- 
ure that poetic love which the normal heart is no more 
capable of feeling than the normal mind is capable of 
producing his poetry. A love which was like his land- 
scapes, not of this world or of the earth earthy — a 
love of the mind, the imagination, the poetic faculty. 
A love whose desire was not to possess, but to kneel to. 



320 THE DREAMER 

In his rhapsodies over the phantasmal women his genius 
created or the real ones whose charm he felt, it was 
never of flesh and blood beauty — of blooming cheek or 
rounded form — that he sang, but of the expression of 
the eye, the tones of the voice, the graces and gifts of 
the spirit and the intellect. 

In return for this love he asked only sympathy — 
sympathy such as he drew from the sky and the forest 
and the rock-bound lake and the winds of heaven — 
mood sympathy. 

It was a love quite beyond the imagination of Rufus 
Griswold to conceive of, even. His furtive eye was on 
the watch, his jealous heart was filled with foul sur- 
mises and he added a new poison to the old, with which 
he was working, drop by drop, upon the good name of 
Edgar Poe. 

Meantime the poet, harassed by troubles of divers 
kinds but innocent of the new poison as he had been of 
the old, welcomed the intimacy of this congenial woman 
friend as balm to his tried spirit; and delved away at 
his work. 

Upon his desk one morning, were piled a number of 
the small rolls of narrow manuscript with which the 
reader is familiar. These were a series of critical 
sketches entitled "The Literati of New York," by 
which he hoped to keep the pot boiling some days. Vir- 
ginia was listening for a step on the stair, for she had 
written Mrs. Osgood a note that morning, begging her 
to come to them, and she knew that she would respond. 
The door opened and the slight, graceful figure and 
delicate face with the gentle eyes, she looked for, ap- 
peared. 

"What are all these?" asked the visitor, when she 
had embraced Virginia warmly and when the poet had. 



TEE DREAMER 321 

after bowing over her hand, which he lightly touched 
with his lips, led her to a chair. 

Her eyes were fixed upon the pile of manuscripts. 

" One of them is yourself. Madam," replied the poet. 

" Myself ? " she questioned, in amazement. 

He bowed, gravely. "Yourself — as one of the Lite- 
rati of New York. In each one of these one of you is 
rolled up and discussed. I will show you by the differ- 
ence in their length the varying degrees of estimation 
in which I hold you literary folk. Come Virginia, and 
help me ! " 

The fair visitor smiled as they drew out to the 
full length roll after roll of the manuscript — letting 
them fly together again as if they had been spiral 
springs. The largest they saved for the last. The 
poet lifted it from its place and gave an end to his 
wife and like two merry, laughing children they ran 
to opposite corners, stretching the manuscript diagon- 
ally across the entire space between. 

"And whose 'linked sweetness long drawn out' is 
that ? " asked the visitor. 

" Hear her ! '' cried Edgar Goodf ellow who was in 
the ascendent for the first time in many a long day. 
" Hear her ! Just as if her vain little heart didn't tell 
her it's herself ! " 

But the moment of playfulness was a rarity, and all 
the more enjoyed for that. 

The papers came out in due course, serially, and 
created a new sensation and brought their little reward, 
but they also plunged their author into a succession of 
unsavory quarrels. As each one appeared, it was looked 
for with eagerness and read with intense interest by 
the public, but frequently with as intense anger by the 
subject. 



322 THE DREAMER 

Perhaps the most caustic of all the critiques was the 
one upon the work of Mr. Thomas Dunn English, 
whom Poe contemptuously dubbed, "Thomas Done 
Brown." 

Mr. English bitterly retorted with an attack upon 
his critic's private character. A fierce controversy fol- 
lowed in which English became so abusive that Poe 
sued and recovered two hundred and twenty-five dol- 
lars damages — which goes to prove that even an ill wind 
can blow good. 

Long after the papers had been published the scene 
of playful idleness, with all its holiday charm, when 
Edgar Poe drew out the strips of manuscript in which 
were rolled up " The Literati of New York '' remained 
in Mrs. Osgood's memory, and in his own. To him it 
was indeed a gleam of brightness amid a throng of 
"earnest woes," a season of calm in a "tumultous 
sea." 

But, as been said, why dwell upon the details of 
that bleak, despairing winter ? Spring brought a change 
which makes a more pleasant picture. 

Ever since they had left Philadelphia the Poes had 
clung, in memory, to the rose-embowered cottage in 
Spring Garden. There, they told each other, they had 
a home to their minds. It was the dear " Muddie," 
their ever faithful earthly Providence to whom they 
were already so deeply indebted, who discovered in the 
suburb of Fordham, a tiny cottage which had much of 
the charm of which they dreamed — even to the infini- 
tesimal price for which it could be rented. 

It was only a story and a half high, but there was a 
commodious and cheerful room down stairs, with four 
windows, and from the narrow hallway a quaint little 



THE DREAMER 

winding stair led to an attic which though its roof was 
low and sloping contained a room large enough to serve 
the double purpose of bed-chamber and study. 

There was a pleasant porch across the front of the 
cottage which would make an ideal summer sitting- 
room and study, when the half-starved rose-bush upon 
it should have been nursed and trained to screen it 
from the sun. 

The cottage stood upon a green hill, half-buried in 
cherry trees — just then in full bloom and filled with 
bird-song. Nearby was a grove of pines and a short 
walk away was the Harlem River, with its picturesque, 
high, stone bridge. It was an abode fit to be in Para- 
dise, Edgar told Virginia and the Mother, and within 
a few days they and their few small possessions — in- 
cluding Catalina — were as well established there as if 
they had never known any other home. 

The moving in recalled the earliest days of their 
life at Spring Garden. Again "Muddie" was busy, 
not with soap and water only, but with the whitewash 
brush. Again their hearts were blythe with the pleas- 
ing sense of change — of the opening up of a new vista 
of there was no knowing what happiness — just as chil- 
dren welcome any change for the change itself, always 
expecting to find pleasant surprises upon a new and 
untried road. 

But there was a difference in themselves since the 
moving into the Spring Garden Cottage, which had 
been so gradual that they were scarcely conscious of 
it. The years since then lay heavily upon them. They 
showed plainly in the deepened lines in Mother Clemm's 
face, in the deepened anxiety in her Mater Dolorosa 
eyes, in the frost upon the locks that peeped from 
under her immaculate widow's cap. They showed in 



324 THE DREAMER 

the fragile figure of Virginia^ — once so full of sweet 
curves; — in the ethereal look that had come into the 
once rounded cheeks and full pouting lips, in the trans- 
parency of her skin and in the sweet eyes that when not 
filled with the merry laughter that had through thick 
and thin filled her dwelling place with sunshine and 
music, had a faraway expression in them, as if they 
were looking into another world. 

They showed most of all in The Dreamer himself. 
To him these years had been years of fierce battle; 
battle, not for wealth, but for bread ; battle not so much 
for selfish ambition as for his country, and in a high 
sense — for he had fought valiantly to win a place for 
America in the world of letters; battle with himself — 
with the devils that sought mastery over his spirit — 
the devil of excitement and exhilaration that lay in 
the bottom of the cup, the devil of blessed forgetful- 
ness, accompanied by magical dreams that dwelt in the 
heart of the poppy, the devil of melancholy and gloom 
to whom he felt a certain charm in yielding himself, 
the devil of restlessness and dissatisfaction with what- 
soever lay within his grasp — a dog-and-shadow sort of 
desire to drop the prize in hand in a chase after that 
of his vision, — the impish devil of the perverse. 

At times he had been victorious, at other times there 
had been defeat. But always the warfare had been 
fierce and the scars remained to tell the story. They 
remained in the emaciation and the deep lines of his 
still beautiful face; remained in the drooping curves 
of the mouth; remained above all in the ineffable sad- 
ness of the large, deep, luminous eyes. 

Yet that sweet spring day when the three were mov- 
ing into Fordham cottage, the years that had wrought 
upon them thus were as they had not been. 



TEE DREAMER 325 

Their little possessions had dwindled pitifully. Vir- 
ginia's golden harp that had been the glory of the sit- 
ting-room was gone to pay a debt. One by one others of 
their household gods had provided bread. But the spurt 
of prosperity the damages recovered in the " Thomas 
Done Brown" suit brought, made possible a new 
checked matting for the sitting-room floor and so bright 
and clean did it look that they felt it almost furnished 
the room of itself. It would mean much to them in 
saving the dear Mother the most laborious feature of 
her labor. It was a more difficult matter than formerly 
for her to get down upon her knees to scrub the floor 
and it had become impossible for the frail Virginia to 
help her in such work; yet as long as the floor was 
bare she had kept it as spotless and nearly as white as 
new fallen snow. When the matting had been laid, 
Eddie took her beautiful worn hands in his and kissed 
first one and then the other. 

"No more scrubbing of the sitting-room floor, dear 
hands/' he playfully said. 

In addition to the matting there were in the way of 
furnishings only a few chairs, some book-shelves, a pic- 
ture or two, vases for flowers, some sea-shells, and, of 
course, Edgar's desk. Above the desk hung the pencil- 
sketch of " Helen " from which somehow, he was always 
able to draw inspiration. Sometimes the wings of his 
imagination would droop, his pen would halt. In 
desperation he would look up at the picture. — Could 
it be (he would ask himself) that her spirit had come 
to dwell in this representation of her which he had 
made from memory? Her eyes seemed to look at him 
through the eyes in the picture — the past came back 
to him as it sometimes did when the mingled scent of 



326 THE DREAMER 

magnolias and roses on the summer night air placed 
him back beneath her window. 

From this portrait of the lovely dead upon the wall, 
from the miniature of the lovely dead that he carried 
always next his heart, and from the lovely being who 
walked, in life, by his side, but toward whose bosom 
death had this long time pointed a warning finger, came 
all his inspiration in the new, as in each of the old 
homes. 

Upstairs, close under the sloping roof, was the bare 
bed-room, barer than the one below — for there was no 
checked matting upon the floor, and there were only 
such pieces of furniture as were an absolute necessity: 
but against a small window in the end of the room 
leaned a great cherry-tree. The windows were open 
and the faint fragrance of the llossoms floated in with 
the song and gossip of the nesting birds. Edgar and 
Virginia laughed together like happy children and told 
each other that they would " play " that their room 
under the roof was a nest in the tree — which was so 
much more poetical than living in an attic. 

And roundabout the cottage on the green hill, with 
its screen of blossoming cherry trees and (hardby) its 
dusky grove of Heaven-kissing pines, and its views of 
the river and walk leading to the stone-arched bridge, 
the three who lived for each other only had erelong 
reconstructed the wonderful dream-valley — the Valley 
of the Many-Colored Grass. 

And the cottage at Fordham became a Mecca to th€ 
"literati of New York," even as the cottage at Spring 
Garden had been a Mecca to the literati of Philadel- 
phia. Among those who made pilgrimages tliither were 
many of the " starry sisterhood of poetesses " — chief 
of whom was the fair Frances Osgood. Yet in his re- 



TEE DREAMER 327 

tirement The Dreamer enjoyed for the first time since 
he had left Spring Garden long intervals of relief from 
company, and in the pine-wood and on the bridge over- 
looking the river, he found what his soul had long 
hungered for— silence and solitude. Under their influ- 
ence he conceived the idea of a new work — a more 
ambitious work than anything he had hitherto at- 
tempted — a work in the form of a prose poem upon 
no less subject than " The Universe/^ whose deep se- 
crets it was designed to reveal, with the title " Eureka !'' 

Ah, Dreamer, could we but call the curtain here ! — 
Could we but leave 3^011 in your cottage on the hill-top, 
overlooking the river, with the trees full of blossom and 
music about it, and the wood inviting 3^our fancy, 
where as you pace back and forth with your hands clasped 
behind you your great deep eyes are filled with the mel- 
low light that illumines them when they are turned in- 
ward exploring the treasures of your brain — leave you 
deep in the high joy of meditation upon God's Uni- 
verse ! 

But ^^ the play is the tragedy, *Man,' '' and it is only 
for the dread " Conqueror " to give the word, " Cur- 
tain down — lights out ! " 



328 THE DREAMER 



CHAPTER XXXL 

All too soon the Wolf scratched at the door of the 
cottage on Fordham Hill. All too soon the shadow 
that had so often enveloped the rose-embowered cottage 
in Spring Garden — the shadow from the wing of the 
Angel of Death — fell upon -l-he cottage among the 
cherry trees. 

The Dreamer sat before his desk under the picture of 
" Helen/^ for hours and hours, or when Virginia was 
too ill to be up, at a little table beside her bed in the 
chamber which was like a nest in a tree. In fair 
weather and foul the stately figure and sorrowful eyes 
of Mother Clemm were to be seen upon the streets of 
New York as she went about offering the narrow rolls 
of manuscript for sale as fast as they were finished, or 
trying to collect the little, over-due checks from those 
already sold and published. Yet, with all they could 
do, had it not been for the generous gifts of friends 
the three must needs have succumbed to cold and hun- 
ger. And all the time the poison that fell from Rufus 
Griswold's tongue was at work. Even the visits of the 
angels of mercy who ministered to him and his invalid 
wife in this their darkest hour were made, by the work- 
ing of this poison, to appear as things of evil. How 
was one of the furtive eye and the black heart of a 
Rufus Griswold to understand love of woman of which 
reverence was a chief ingredient? 

These ministering angels — Mrs. Osgood, Mrs. Gove, 
Mrs. Marie Louise Shew, and others whose love for the 
racked and broken Dreamer and for herself Virginia 
so perfectly understood — Virginia the guileless, with 



TEE DREAMER 329 

her sense for spiritual things and her warm, responsive 
heart — brought to the cottage not only encouragement 
and sympathy, but medicines and delicacies which were 
offered in such manner that even one of Edgar Poe'f? 
sensitive pride could accept them without shame. 

Summer passed, and autumn^ and winter drew on — 
filling the dwellers in Fordham cottage with fear of 
they knew not what miseries. There had been ups and 
downs; there had been happiness and woe; there had 
been times of strength and times of weakness — of weak- 
ness when The Dreamer, unable to hold out in the 
desperate battle of life as he knew it ; hungry, cold and 
heartbroken at the sight of his wife with that faraway 
look in her eyes, had fallen^ — had sought and found 
forgetfulness only to know a horrible awakening that 
was despair and that was oftentimes accompanied by 
illness. Now, there was added to every thing else the 
knowledge that she^ — his wife — his heartsease flower, 
and the Mother, in spite of all his striving for them, 
were objects of charity. 

Wh.Qii some of his friends, in the kindness of their 
hearts, published in one of the papers an appeal to the 
admirers of Edgar Poe's work for aid for him and his 
family in their distress, he came out in a proud denial 
of their need for aid. The need was great enough, 
God knows ! — but the pitiful exposure was more pain- 
ful than the pangs of cold and hunger. 

At last the day drew near of whose approach all who 
had visited the cottage knew but of which they had 
schooled themselves not to think. 

January 1847 was waning. For many days the 
ground had not been seen. The branches of the cherry 
trees gleamed — not with flowers, but with icicles — as 



330 THE DREAMER 

they leaned against the windows of the bed-chamber 
under the roof. Sometimes as the winter blast stirred 
them, they knocked against the panes with a sound 
the knuckles of a skeleton might have made. There 
was not the slightest suggestion of the soft-voiced 
'^^Ligeia" in that harsh, horrible sound. 

Upon the bed the girl-wife lay well nigh as still and 
as white as the snow outside. Now and again she 
coughed — a weak, ghostly sort of cough. Over her 
wasted body, in addition to the thin bed-clothing, lay 
her husband's old military cape. Against her breast 
nestled Catalina, purring contentedly while she kept 
the heart of her mistress warm a little longer. Near 
the foot of her bed the Mother sat — a more perfect 
picture than ever of the Mater Dolorosa — chafing the 
tiny cold feet; at the head her husband bent over her 
and chafed her hands. About the room, but not near 
enough to intrude upon the sacred grief of the stricken 
mother and husband, sat several of the good women 
whose friendship had been the mainstay of the three. 
Through the window, gaining brilliance from the ice- 
laden branches outside, fell the rays of the setting sun, 
glorifying the room and the bed. Scarce a word was 
spoken, but upon the request of the dying girl for music 
one of the visitors began to sing in low, tremulous 
tones, the beautiful old hymn, " Jerusalem the Golden." 
To the man, bowed beneath his woe as it had been a 
physical weight, the words came as a knell, and a 
blacker despair than ever settled upon his wild eyes 
and haggard face. To his dying wife they were a prom- 
ise — the smile upon her lip and the look of wonder in 
her eyes showed that she was already beholding the 
glories of which the old hymn told. 



THE DREAMER 331 

And so wandered her spirit out of the cold and the 
want and the gloom that had darkened and chilled the 
Valley of the Man3^-Colored Grass, into the regions 
of "bliss beyond compare." 

But her husband, left behind, was as the man in his 
own story, " Silence," who sat upon a rock) — the gray 
and ghastly rock of "Desolation." "With his brow 
lofty with thought and his eyes wild with care and the 
fables of sorrow and weariness and disgust with man- 
kind written in furrows upon his cheek," he sat upon 
the lonely grey rock and leaned his head upon his hand 
and looked out upon the desolation. She was no more 

— no more! — the maiden who lived with no other 
thought than to love and be loved by him ; — his wife — 
in all the storm and stress of his troubled life his true 
heartsease ! 

Out of the desolation he perceived a thing that was 
formless, that was invisible — but that was appalling — 
silence. Silence that made him shrink and quake — he 
that had loved, had longed for silence! Silence would 
crush him now. And solitude ! — how often he had 
craved it ! He had solitude a plenty now. 

Like a hunted animal, he looked about for a refuge 
from the Silence and the Solitude that gave him chase, 
but he knew that however fast he might flee they would 
be hard on his heels. 

How white she was — and how still ! Nevermore to 
hear the sounds of her low sweet voice, nevermore to 
hear her merry laughter, nevermore her light foot-step 
that^ — like her voice and her laugh — was music to his 
ears ! Nevermore ! — for she was wrapped in the Silence 

— the last great silence of all. 

Nevermore would she sit beside him as he worked, or 
plant flowers about the door, or lay her hand in his 



332 THE DREAMER 

and explore with him the wonderful dream-valley; 
nevermore lay her sweet lips upon his or raise the snow- 
white lids from her eyes and shine on him from under 
their long, jetty fringes. Henceforth a Solitude as 
vast as the Silence would be his portion. 

Their sweet friend Marie Louise Shew robed her 
for the tomb and over the snow they bore her to rest 
in a vault in the village churchyard. 

Then, for many weeks Edgar Poe lay in the bed- 
chamber under the roof, desperately ill — for the most 
part unconscious. The mother bereaved of her child 
had no time to give herself over to mourning, for as 
she had wrestled with death for the possession of a 
son when he was first given into her keeping, even 
more fiercely did she wrestle now that he must be son 
and daughter too. The kind friends who had made 
Virginians last days comfortable aided her in the battle, 
and finally the victory was won, — pale, shaken, wraith- 
like, the personification of woe made beautiful — The 
Dreamer came forth into the air of heaven once more, 
and as spring opened was to be seen, as of old, walking 
among the pines or beside the river. 

And ever and anon his clear-cut, chastened features 
and his great, solemn eyes were turned slryward — 
especially at night when the heavens were sown with 
stars; for from some one of those bright worlds, per- 
adventure, would she whose absence made the Solitude 
and the Silence be looking down upon him. And as he 
gazed and dreamed, high thoughts took form in his 
brain — thoughts of the "Material and Spiritual Uni- 
verse; its Essence, its Origin, its Creation, its Present 
Condition and its Destiny," — thoughts to be made into 
a book dedicated to " Those who feel rather than to 
those who think — to the dreamers and those who put 



THE DREAMER 333 

faith in dreams as in the only realities" — thoughts 
for his projected work, " Eureka ! " Out of the Silence 
and the Solitude came the development and completion 
of this strange prose poem. 

Like an uneasy spirit he wandered, night and day, 
up and down the river bank, in the wood or in the 
churchyard that held the tomb of his Virginia. 

Meanwhile the Mother still kept the cottage bright. 
She asked no questions when he went forth, night or 
day, or when he came in, night or day; but her heart 
bled for him and sometimes when he would throw him- 
self into a deep chair and sit by the hour, seemingly 
staring at nothing, but really (she knew by the 
harassed and brooding look in the great, deep eyes) 
"dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream be- 
fore/' she would steal gently to his side and with her 
long, slim, expressive fingers stroke the large brow 
until natural sleep brought respite from painful 
memories. Her ministrations were grateful to him, yet 
he was barely conscious of her presence. Not even for 
her, and far less for any other human being, did he feel 
kinship at this time. His vision, when not turned 
within, looked far beyond human companionship to the 
wonders of the universe^ — the stars and the mountains 
and the forests and the rivers; but his only real com- 
panion was his own stricken heart. Many times he said 
to his heart in the prophetic words of his fantastic 
creation, "Morella," 

" Thy days henceforth shall be days of sorrow — that 
sorrow which is the most lasting of impressions as thv3 
cypress is the most enduring of trees. For the hours 
of thy happiness are over, and joy is not gathered 
twice in a lifetime as the roses of Paestum twice in a 
year." 



334 TEE DREAMER 

Yet as the back is fitted to tlie burden and tlie wind 
tempered to the shorn lamb, so again, as in his early 
griefs, the sorrow of The Dreamer was not all pain, 
there was an element of beauty — of poetry — in it that 
made it possible to be endured. Out of the depths of 
the Solitude and the Silence he said to his soul, 

" It is a happiness to wonder — it is a happiness to 
dream.'' And more than ever before in his life his 
whole existence had become a dream — the realities being 
mere shadows. 

To dream, to wonder, to work; to work, to wonder, 
to dream — thus were the hours, the hours of sorrow, 
spent. The hours of which the poet lost all count, for 
between his dreams and his work so intensely full were 
the hours of vivid mental living that each day was as a 
lifetime in itself. 

And as he wandered under the pines or along the 
river, wrapped in his dreams and wondering thoughts 
of heaven and earth, or leaned from the window of the 
chamber under the low sloping roof — the chamber that 
had been the chamber of death — and looked beyond the 
embowering cherry trees upon the sky; or at dead of 
night sat under his lamp pondering over his books — 
always, everywhere, he listened — listened for the voice 
and the foot-falls of Virginia as he had listened in his 
earlier days for the voice and the footfalls of the mythi- 
cal " Ligeia." For had she not promised that she 
would watch over him in spirit and, if possible, give 
him frequent indications of her presence — sighing upon 
him in the evening winds or filling the air which he 
breathed with perfume from the censers of the angels? 

And her promises were faithfully kept, for often as 
he listened he heard the sounds of the swinging of the 
censers of the angels, and streams of a holy perfume 



THE DREAMER 335 

floated about him, and when his heart beat heavily the 
winds that bathed his brow came to him laden with 
soft sighs, and indistinct murmurs filled the night air. 

And so the green spring and the flowery summer 
passed, and autumn drew on. 

Then came a day of days — a soft October day when 
merely to exist was to be happy and to hope. And new 
life, like some sweet, rejuvenating cordial seemed to 
enter and course through the veins of The Dreamer and 
for the first time since the Silence and the Solitude had 
enveloped the cottage he laughed as he flung wide the 
windows of the chamber that had been the chamber of 
death, to let in the day. And as he looked forth he 
said, again quoting the words of his "Morella," 

" The winds lie still in heaven. There is a dim moist- 
ure over all the earth and a warm glow upon the waters, 
and upon the forest a rainbow — a bow of promise — 
from the firmament has surely fallen. It is not a day 
for sorrow but for joy, for it is a day out of Aidenn 
itself, and I feel that ere it has passed I shall hold 
sweeter, more real communion with her that is in 
Aidenn than ever before." 

He went forth and wandered through the radiance 
of that perfect day hours on hours, and as he paced 
the solemn aisles of the pine wood, or strolled along the 
river walk which was veiled in a golden haze and car- 
peted thick with the yellow and crimson and brown 
leaves of October, he heard, clearly, the sound of the 
swinging of the censers of the angels, as his senses were 
bathed in the holy perfume, and the zephyrs that blew 
about his brow were laden with audible sweet mur- 
murs. 

As evening fell a pleasant langour possessed his limbs 



336 THE DREAMER 

— a wholesome weariness from his long wanderings — 
and he lay down upon a bank littered with fallen leaves 
and slept. And as he slept in the fading light, the 
spirit of Virginia approached him more nearly — more 
tangibly — than ever before; and finally^ when the red 
sun had sunli into the river, and when the afterglow in 
the sky and the rainbow that lay upon the forest were 
alike blotted out by the shadows of night, and the 
moon — a lustrous blur through the haze — wandered un- 
certainly up the sky, she drew nearer and nearer, and 
pressed a fluttering kiss — such a kiss as a butterfly 
might bestow upon a flower — upon his lips ; then, sigh- 
ing, drew away. 

The sleeper awoke with a start — a start of heavenly 
bliss followed by instant pain — for as he peered into 
the night he saw that he was alone — with the Silence 
and the Solitude. The winds lay still in heaven and 
bore him no whisper or sigh. The perfume from the 
censers of the angels still filled the air, but he was 
conscious of a great void — a pain unbearable. The 
kiss had awakened a thousand thronging memories; 
the kiss had robbed of their charm the elusive per- 
fume, and the ghostly whisper of fluttering garments, 
and the shadowy foot-falls, and the faint, faraway sighs. 
Henceforth these would cease to satisfy. The kiss had 
made him know the want of his heart for love and 
companionship, such as the living Virginia had given 
him. 

He listened and listened, but the winds lay still in 
heaven, and he was alone with the Silence — the dread 
Silence — and the heart-hunger, and the despair. 

Then he arose from his bed of withered and sere 
leaves and as one distraught, wandered through the 
shadows of the misty, weird night. In the wood and 



THE DREAMER 337 

by the waters he wandered, while the night wore on 
and the moon held its way — still a lustrous blur in the 
heavens. 

On, on he wandered, seeking peace for his soul and 
finding none, till the moon was out and the stars 
fainted in the twilight of the approaching day, when 
lo, above the end of the path through the wood, the 
morning star — "Astarte's bediamonded crescent" — 
arose upon his vision ! 

And as he gazed with wonder and delight upon the 
beautiful star, hope was born anew in his heart, for he 
said, 

"It is the Star of Love!" 

He that had always looked for signs in the sides, 
had he not found one? What could it mean, this rising 
of the Star of Love upon the hour of his bitterest need 
but a sign of hope, of peace ? 

Vainly did his soul upbraid him and warn him not 
to trust the beacon — to fly from its alluring light and 
cast aside its spell. All deaf to the warning, he eager- 
ly followed the star which promised renewal of hope 
and love and relief from the Solitude and the Silence — 
the desolation that the kiss had made so real and in- 
tolerable. 

But alas, as he wandered on and on, his eyes upon 
the star, his feet following blindly, without marking 
the path into which they had turned, his progress was 
suddenly checked. Through the misty twilight of the 
approaching dawn there loomed an obstacle to his steps. 
It was with horror unspeakable that he recognized the 
vault in which lay, in her last sleep, his loved Vir- 
ginia. . . . 

" Then his heart it grew ashen and sober 
As the leaves that were crisped and sere, — 
As the leaves that were withering and sere! " 



338 THE DREAMER 

The Star of Love was fading in the eastern sky aud 
through the ghostly dawn he turned and fled aghast to 
the cottage among the cherry trees. 

Mother Clemm who had lain waiting and watching 
for him all night arose from her uneasy couch when she 
heard the latch of the gate lifted, and opened the door. 
He came in and walked past her like a wraith. His 
eyes were wild, his face was bloodless and haggard, his 
hair damp and disordered. The Mother's eyes were 
filled with dumb pain. He suffered her to take his 
hand in hers and to gaze into his eyes with pity and 
even raised the hand that held his own to his lips, as 
though to reassure her; but he spake no word — made 
no attempt at explanation — and she asked no ques- 
tions. 

For a moment he remained beside her, then straight 
to his desk he walked and began arranging writing 
materials before him, while she disappeared into the 
kitchen and started a blaze under a pot of coffee that 
stood upon the little stove. 

He wrote rapidly — furiously — without pausing for 
thought or for the fastidious choice of words that was 
apt to make him halt frequently in the act of com- 
position, and the words that he wrote were the wild 
words — wild, but beautiful and moving as an echo 
from Israf el's own lute — of the poem, " Ulalume : " 

" The skies they were ashen and sober ; 
The leaves they were crisped and sere, — 
The leaves they were withering and sere, — 
It was night in the lonesome October 
Of my most immemorial year." 

After that eventful night a change came over him 
that sat upon the Rock of Desolation. The Solitude 



THE DREAMER 339 

and the Silence still enfolded him, but the Star of Love 
had arisen in his firmament, ushering in a new day and 
new hope to his soul. And he no longer trembled as 
he sat upon the rock, but with new energy he worked 
and with exceeding patience he waited. And as he 
worked interest in life returned to him, and ambition 
returned. 

One day he copied " Ulalume " upon a long, narrow 
slip of paper and rolled it into one of the tight little 
rolls that all the editors knew and Mother Clemm 
made a pilgrimage to the city especially on account of 
it. First she tried it at The Union Magazine, which 
promptly rejected it. It was too ^^ queer" the editor 
said. But The American Review agreed to take it and 
to print it without signature — for this poem must be 
published anonymously, if at all, the poet insisted. It 
soon afterward appeared and Mr. Willis copied it into 
the next number of The Home Journal with compli- 
mentary editorial comment. 

The result was a new sensation — the reader every- 
where declared himself to be brought under a magic 
spell by the words of this remarkable poem — though 
he frankly owned that he did not in the least under- 
stand them; which was as Edgar Poe intended. 

Even the old dream of founding a magazine re- 
turned and possessed him as it had so often possessed 
him before. It was in the interest of the magazine, 
which he still proposed to name The Stylus, that he 
determined to give his new work, " Eureka ! " as a lec- 
ture, in various places. He did give it once — in New 
York — coming out of his seclusion for the first time, 
upon a frosty February night. The rhapsody, deliv- 
ered in his low but musical and dramatic tones, thrilled 



340 THE DREAMER 

his audience, but it was a small audience, and when 
soon afterward, the work was published by the Putnams 
it was a small number of copies that was sold. 

And again Edgar Poe was desperately poor. Yet 
he had seen the Star of Love — "Astarte's bediamonded 
crescent^' — usher in a new morning; and he waited 
and worked in hope. 



THE DREAMER 341 



CHAPTEE XXXII. 



Autumn with its enchanted October night, and winter 
filled with work and spent in deep seclusion at Ford- 
ham, and spring with its revival of plans for Tlic 
Stylus, and the appearance of "Eureka!" as a book, 
and its author's return to the world as a lecturer, slipped 

by. 

About midsummer The Dreamer lay a night in the 
old town of Providence. It was a warm night and the 
window of his room was open — letting in a flood of light 
from the full moon. He leaned from the window which 
looked upon a plot of flowers whose many odors rising, 
enveloped him in incense sweet as the incense from 
the censers of the angels when the spirit of his Vir- 
ginia was near. But it was not of Virginia that the 
fragrance told him tonight. Something about the 
blended odors, combined with the sensuous warmth of 
the night and the light of the moon, transported him 
suddenly, magically, back through the years to his boy- 
hood and to the little room in the Allan cottage on 
Clay Street, hanging, like' this room, over a space of 
flowers — the night following the day when he had 
first seen Eob Stanard's mother. 

Back, back into the long dead past he wandered! 
The broken and jaded Edgar Poe was dreaming again 
the dream of the fresh, enthusiastic boy, Edgar Poe. 

How every incident of that day and night stood out 
in his memory! He could feel again the wonder that 
he felt when he saw the beautiful " Helen " standing 
against the arbor- vitas in the garden; could see her 
graceful approach to meet and greet him — the lonely 



343 THE DREAMER 

orphan boy — could hear her gracious words in praise 
of his mother while she held his hand in both her own. 
As he lived it all over again, with the silver moon- 
light enfolding him and the breath of the flowers fill- 
ing his nostrils, a clock somewhere in the house struck 
the night's noon hour. He started — even so it had 
been that other night in the long past. He half be- 
lieved that if he should go forth into this night as he 
had gone into that he should see once more the lady 
of his dream, with the lamp in her hand, framed in the 
ivy-wreathed window, and seeing, worship as he had 
worshipped then. 

Scarce knowing what he did, he arose and hurrying 
down the stair was in the street. The streets were 
strange to him but there was a pleasant sense of ad- 
venture in wandering through thenij — he knew not 
whither — and the sweet airs of the flowers were every- 
where. 

Suddenly he stopped. While all the town slept there 
was one beside himself, who kept vigil. Clad all in 
white, she half reclined upon a violet bank in an old 
garden where the moon fell on the upturned faces of a 
thousand roses and on her own, " upturned, — alas, in 
sorrow ! " 

Faint with the beauty and the poetry of the scene he 
leaned upon the gate of the 

" enchanted garden 
Where no wind dared to stir unless on tiptoe." 

He dared not speak or give any sign of his presence, 
but he gazed and gazed until to his entranced eyes it 
seemed that 



THE DREAMER 343 

" The pearly lustre of the moon went out: 
The mossy banks and the meandering paths — 
The happy flowers and the repining trees — 
Were seen no more." 

All was lost to his vision — 

" Save only the divine light in those eyes — 
Save but the soul in those uplifted eyes," 



He continued to gaze until the moon disappeared 
behind a bank of cloud and he watched the white-robed 
figure glide away like "a ghost amid the entombing 
trees." Yet still (it seemed to him) the eyes remained. 
They lighted his lonely footsteps home that night and 
he told himself that they would light him henceforth, 
through the years. 

Nearly a year had passed since that October night 
when the Star of Love ushering in a new morning had 
prophesied to him of new hope — nearly a year through 
which he had] waited patiently, but not in vain. The 
time had evidently come for the prophecy to be ful- 
filled and Fate had led him to this town and the spot 
in this town where she that was to be (he was con- 
vinced) the hope, the guide, the savior, of his " lone- 
some latter years" awaited him. 

Who was she ? — 

So spirit-like, so ethereal, she seemed, as robed in 
white and veiled in silvery moon-beams she sat among 
the slumbering roses, and as she was gathered into the 
shadows of the entombing trees, that she might almost 
have been the ^^Lady Ligeia." Yet he knew that she 
was not. The " Lady Ligeia" had been but the crea- 
tion of his own brain. Very fair she had been to his 



344 THE DREAMER 

dreaming vision, very sweet her companionship had 
been to his imagination — sufficient for all the needs of 
his being in his youthful days when sorrow was but 
a beautiful sentiment, when "terror was not fright, 
but a tremulous delight." but how was such an one 
as she to bind up the broken heart of a man? It was 
the human element in the eyes of her that sat among 
the roses that enchained him. Ethereal — spirit-like — 
as she was, the eyes upturned in sorrow were the eyes 
of no spirit, but of a woman ; from them looked a human 
soul with the capacity and the experience to offer sjrm- 
pathy meet for human needs — the needs even, oi a 
broken-hearted man. 

How dark the woe! — how sublime the hope! — how 
intense the pride! — how daring the ambition! — how 
deep, how fathomless the capacity for love! — that 
looked (as from a window) from those eyes upturned 
in sorrow, in the moonlight while all the town slept ! 

Who was she? — this lady of sorrows. And by what 
sweet name was she known to the citizens of this old 
town ? — Surely Fate that had brought her to the bank 
of violets beneath the moon — Fate that had led him to 
her garden gate, would in Fate's own time reveal ! 

As Helen Whitman flitted as noiselessly as the ghost 
she seemed to be up the dark stairway to her chamber, 
and without closing the casement that admitted the 
moonlight and the garden's odors, lay down upon her 
canopied bed, she trembled. What was it that she had 
been aware of in the garden? — that presence — that 
consciousness of communion between her spirit and his 
upon whom all her thoughts had dwelt of late? Her- 
self a poet, from her earliest knowledge of the work 
of Edgar Poe she had geemed to feel a kinship between 



THE DREAMER 345 

her mind and his such as she had known in regard to 
no other. She had followed his career step by step, and 
out of the many sorrows of her own life had been born 
deep sympathy for him. Since his last, greatest blow, 
she had more than ever mourned with him in spirit, 
for she too was widowed — she too had sat upon the 
Eock of Desolation and knew the Silence and the Soli- 
tude. 

She and The Dreamer had at least one mental trait 
in common — a tendency toward spiritualism — a more 
than half belief in the communion of the spirits of the 
dead with those of the living and of those of the living 
with each other. 

What had led her into the moonlit garden when all 
the world slept? 

She knew not. She only knew that she had felt an 
impelling influence — a call to her spirit — to come out 
among the slumbering roses. She had not questioned 
nor sought to define it. She had heard it, and she 
had obeyed. And then the presence ! — 

She had never seen Edgar Poe, yet she felt that he 
had been there in the spirit, if not in the flesh — she 
had felt his eyes upon her eyes and she had half ex- 
pected him to step from the shadows around her and to 
say, 

" I, upon whom your thoughts have dwelt — I, who 
am the comrade and the complement of your inner 
life — I, whose spirit called to you ere you came into 
the garden — • I am here." 

It was almost immediately upon The Dreamer's re- 
turn to Fordham, and when he was still under the 
spell of the night at Providence, that the identity of 
the lady of the garden was revealed to him, in a man- 



346 THE DREAMER 

ner seemingly accidental, but which he felt to be but 
another manifestation of the divinity that shapes our 
ends. Some casual words concerning the appearance 
and character of Mrs. W^iiitman, spoken by a casual 
visitor^ lifted the curtain. 

So the lady of the garden was Helen Whitman ! 
whose poetry had impressed him favorably and whose 
acquaintance he had desired. Helen Whitman — Helen! 
As he repeated the name his heart stood still, — even 
in her name he heard the voice of Fate. Helen — the 
name of the good angel of his boyhood! Were his 
dreams of "Morella" and of *^^Ligeia" to come true? 
Was he to know in reality the miracle he had imagined 
and written of in these two phantasies? — the reincar- 
nation of personal identity? Was he in this second 
Helen, in this second garden, to find again the wor- 
shipped Helen of his boyhood? 

He turned to the lines he had written so long ago, 
in Richmond, when he had gone forth into the mid- 
summer moonlight, even as he had gone forth in Provi- 
dence, and had worshipped under a window, even as he 
had worshipped at a garden gate. He read the first 
two stanzas through. 

As he read he gave himself up to an overwhelming 
sense of fatality. Could anything be more fitting — 
more descriptive ? The end of the days of miracles was 
not yet — this was his " Helen of a thousand dreams ! " 

His impulse was to seek an introduction at once, but 
this seemed too tamely conventional. Besides — he was 
in the hands of Fate — he dared not stir. Fate, hav- 
ing so clearly manifested itself, would find a way. 

His correspondence was always heavy. Letters, clip- 
pings from papers and so forth, came to him by every 
post from friends and from enemies, with and without 



THE DREAMER 347 

signatures. Yet from all the mass, he knew at once 
that the " Valentine/' unsigned as it was, was from her. 
By way of acknowledgment, he turned down a 
page of a copy of " The Eaven and Other Poems " at 
the lines, " To Helen/' and mailed it to her. He 
waited in anxious suspense for a reply, but the lady 
was coy. Days passed and still no answer. The desire 
for communication with her became irresistible and 
taking pen and paper he wrote at the top of the page, 
even as long ago he had written, the words, " To Helen," 
and underneath wrote a new poem especially for this 
new Helen in which he described the vision of her in 
the garden (but placing it in the far past) and his 
feelings as he gazed upon her : 

"I saw thee once — once only — years ago; 
I must not say how many — but not many. 

Clad all in white, upon a violet bank 
I saw thee half reclining; while the moon 
Fell on the upturned faces of the roses, 
And on thine own, upturned, — alas in sorrow! 
Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight — 
Was it not Fate (whose name is also Sorrow) 
That bade me pause before that garden-gate 
To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses? 
No footstep stirred: the hated world all slept. 
Save only thee and me. (Oh, Heaven! — oh, God! 
How my heart beats in coupling those two words!) 
Save only thee and me! " 

The paper trembled in the hands — tiny and spirit- 
likei — of Helen ^AHiitman. Her soul answered em- 
phatically, 

'' It is Fate ! " 



348 TEE DREAMER 

So he had been there in the flesh — near her — in the 
shadows of that mystic night! The presence was no 
creation of an overwrought imagination. It was Fate. 

Tremulously she penned her answer to his appeal, 
but was it Fate again, which caused the letter to mis- 
carry? It reached him finally, in Eichmond — Ricli- 
mond, of all places ! — whither he had gone to deliver 
to audiences of his old friends, his lecture upon " The 
Poetic Principle," in the interest of the establishment 
of his magazine. The Stylus. What could have been 
more fitting than that the gracious words of " Helen 
of a thousand dreams " should come to him in Eich- 
mond? 

Not many days later and he was under her own roof 
in Providence. 

He waited in the dimness of her curtained drawing- 
room, ear strained for the first sound of her footstep. 
Noiselessly as a sunbeam or a shadow she entered the 
room, her gauzy white draperies floating about her slight 
figure as he came, while his great eyes drank in with 
reverent joy each detail of her ethereal loveliness — her 
face, the same he had seen in the garden, pale as a 
pearl and as softly radiant, and framed in clustering 
dark ringlets which escaped in profusion from the con- 
finement of a lacy widow's cap — the tremulous 
mouth — the eyes, mysterious and unearthly, from 
which the soul looked out. 

For one moment she paused in the doorway, her 
hand pressed upon her wildly beating heart — then, 
with hesitating step advanced to meet him. Her words 
of greeting were few, and so low and faltering as to be 
quite unintelligible, but the tones of her voice fell on 
his ear like strangely familiar music. 



THE DREAMER 349 

The man spoke no word. As her eyes rested for 
one brief moment upon his, then fell before the in- 
tensity of his gaze, he was conscious of spiritual influ- 
ences beyond the reach of reason. In a tremulous 
ecstacy he bent and pressed his lips upon the hand 
that lay within his own and it was with difficulty that 
he restrained himself from falling upon his knees 
before her in actual worship. 

Three evenings of "all heavenly delight" he spent 
in her companionship — sometimes in the seclusion and 
dusk of her quiet drawingroom, sometimes walking 
among the roses in her garden, or among the mossy 
tombs in the town cemetery — their sympathetic natures 
finding expression in such conversation as poets de- 
light in. Under the intoxicating spell of her presence 
all other dreams passed, for the time, into nothingness 
and he passionately cried, 

" Helen, I love now — now — for the first and only 
time ! " 

Yet he was poor, and the weaknesses which had 
caused him to fall in the past might cause him to fall 
in the future. How could he plead for a return of his 
love? 

His very self-abasement made his plea more strong. 
Still, she did not yield too suddenly. True, she too, 
was under the spell, but she resisted it. As he found 
his voice, and his eloquence filled the room a restless- 
ness possessed her. Now she sat quite still by his side, 
now rose and wandered about the apartment — now 
stood with her hand resting upon the back of his chair 
while his nearness thrilled her. 

There were objections, she told him — she was older 
than he. 

" Has the soul age, Helen ? " he answered her. " Can 



350 THE DREAMER 

immortality regard time? Can that which began never 
and shall never end consider a few wretched years of 
its incarnate life? Do you not perceive that it is my 
diviner nature — my spiritual being, that burns and 
pants to commingle with your own?'^ 

She urged her frail health as an objection. 

For that he would love — worship her — the more, 
he said. He plead for her pity upon his loneliness^ — 
his sorrows — and swore that he would comfort and 
soothe her in hers, through life, and when death should 
come, joyfully go down with her into the night of the 
grave. 

Finally he appealed to her ambition. 

" Was I right, Helen, in my first impression of you ? 
— in the impression that you are ambitious? If so, 
and if you will have faith in me, I can and will 
satisfy your wildest desires. Would it not be glorious 
to establish in America, the sole unquestionable aris- 
tocracy — that of the intellect — to secure its suprem- 
acy — to lead and control it ? " 

Still tfte yes that so often seemed trembling upon 
her lips was not spoken. She received his almost 
daily letters and his frequent visits, listened to his 
rapturous love-making — trembling, blushing, letting 
him see that she was under the spell, that she loved 
him. Indeed she could not have helped his seeing it 
had she wished; but when he spoke of marriage she 
hesitated — tantalizing him to the point of madness, 
almost. 

What was it that held her back? — She too, believed 
that it was the hand of Fate that had brought them 
together — that they were pre-ordained to cheer each 
other's latter years, to establish that intellectual aris- 
tocracy of which he dreamed. Yet she shrank from 



TEE DREAMER 351 

taking the step. When his great solemn eyes were 
upon her, his beautiful face pale and haggard with 
excess of feeling, turned toward her, Ms eloquent 
words of love in her ears, she sat as one entranced — 
bewitched ; yet she would not give the word he longed 
for — the word of willingness to embark with him 
upon the sea of life. Fear checked her. Such an 
uncharted sea it seemed to her — she dared not say 
him yea! 

The truth was the poison was working — the Gris- 
wold poison. The wildest rumors came to her ears 
of the worse than follies of her lover. She knew that 
they were at least, overdrawn — possibly altogether 
false — yet they frightened her. 

" Do you know Helen Whitman ? " wrote one of 
The Dreamer^s enemies to Dr. Griswold. " Of course 
you have heard it rumored that she is to marry Poe. 
Well, she has seemed to me a good girl and — you know 
what Poe is. Has Mrs. Whitman no friend in your 
knowledge that can faithfully explain Poe to her ? " 

But Eufus Griswold had already " explained Poe " 
to those whom he knew would take pains to pass the 
explanation on to " Helen ^' — had dropped the poison 
where he reckoned it would work with the greatest 
speed and effect. The explanation, with the usual 
indirectness of a Griswold, was sugared with a com- 
pliment. 

" Poe has great intellectual power," he said with 
emphasis, '^ great intellectual power, but," he added, 
with a sidelong glance of the furtive eye and a con- 
fidential drop in the voice, "but — he has no princi- 
ple — no moral sense." 

The poison reached the destination for which it was 
intended — the ears of Helen Whitman — in due 



352 THE DREAMER 

course, and it terrified her as had none of the rumors 
she had heard before. Still her lover floundered in 
the dark — baffled — wondering — not able to make her 
out. Why did she tantalize him — torture him, thus? 
— keeping him dangling between Heaven and hell? — 
he asked himself, and he asked her, over and over 
again. He became more and more convinced that 
there was a reason, — what was it? 

Finally she gave it to him in its baldness and its 
brutality, just as it had come to her — wrote it to him 
in a letter. It brought him a rude awakening from 
his dream of bliss. That such a charge should be 
brought against him at all was bitter enough, but that 
it could be repeated to him by " Helen " seemed un- 
believable. 

" You do not love me," he sadly wrote in reply, '^ or 
you would not have written these terrible words." 
Then he swore a great oath : " By the God who reigns 
in Heaven, I swear to you that my soul is incapable 
of dishonor — that with the exception of occasional 
follies and excesses which I bitterly lament, but to 
which I have been driven by intolerable sorrow, I can 
call to mind no act of my life which would bring a 
blush to my cheek — or to yours." 

He followed the letter with a visit — again throw- 
ing himself at her feet and thrilling her with his 
eloquence and with the magic of his personality. 

She gave him a half promise and said she would 
write to him in Lowell, where he had engaged to de- 
liver a lecture. 

In this town was a roof-tree which was a haven 
of rest to The Dreamer. Beneath it dwelt his friend 
and confidant, "Annie" Eichmond — his souFs sweet 
'^ sister," as he loved to call her. And there he waited 



THE DREAMER 353 

with a chastened joy, for he felt assured that the long 
wished for yes was about to be said, yet dared not 
give himself over prematurely, to the ecstacy that 
would soon be his. In the pleasant, friendly family 
circle of the Eichmonds, he sat during those chill No- 
vember evenings, seeing pictures in the glowing fire, 
as he held sweet "Annie's" sympathetic hand in his, 
while the only sound that broke the silence was the 
ticking of the grandfather's clock in a shadowy cor- 
ner. 

Thus quietly, patiently, he waited. 

But in Providence the Griswold poison was at work. 
All the friends and relatives of " Helen " were pos- 
sessed of full vials of it — which they industriously 
poured into her ears. Against it the recollection of 
the night in the garden and her belief that Fate had 
ordained her union with the poet, had no avail. The 
letter that she sent her lover was more non-committal 
— colder — than any he had received from her before, 
yet there was still enough of indecision in it to keep 
him tantalized. In a state of mind well nigh dis- 
traction, he bade " Annie " and her cheerful fireside 
farewell and set his face toward Providence; but he 
went in a dream — the demon Despair, possessing him. 

Unstrung, unmanned, almost bereft of reason, his 
old dissatisfaction with himself and the world over- 
took him — a longing to be out of it all, for forget- 
fulness, for peace, yea, even the peace of the grave, — 
why not? 

A passionate longing — a homesickness — for the 
sure, the steadfast, the unvariable love of his beautiful 
Virginia consumed him. Oh, if he could but lie down 
and sleep and forget until one sweet day he should 



354 THE DREAMER 

wake in the land where she awaited him, and where 
they would construct anew, and for eternity, the Val- 
ley of the Many-Colored Grass! 

He listened For the first time since 

the Star of Love had ushered in a new day in his life, 
he heard the swinging of the censers of the angels — 
he inhaled the incense — he heard the voice of Vir- 
ginia in the sighing wind. She seemed to call to 
him. 

" I am coming. Heartsease ! " he whispered as he 
quaffed the potion that he reckoned would bear him 
to her. 

But it was not to be. When he awaked, weak and 
ill, but sane, he found himself with friends. Calm- 
ness and strength returned and with them, horror at 
the deed he had so nearly committed, and deep con- 
trition. 

With all haste he again presented himself at the 
door of " Helen," beseeching her to marry him at 
once and save him, as he believed she only could, from 
himself. And the consequences of her indecision mak- 
ing her more alarmed for him than she had formerly 
been for herself, she agreed to an engagement, though 
not to immediate marriage. 

He returned to Fordham and to faithful Mother 
Clemm a wreck of his former self, but engaged to be 
married ! 

Yet he was not happy — a new horror possessed 
him. As in the night when the Star of Love first rose 
upon his vigil it had stopped over the door of " a 
legended tomb," so now again was his pathway closed. 
Turn which way he would, the tomb of Virginia 
seemed to frown upon him. He remembered his 



TEE DREAMER 355 

promise to her that upon no other daughter of earth 
would he look with the eyes of love. Vainly did he 
seek to justify himself to his own heart for breaking 
the promise. No one could ever supplant her, or fill 
the void in his life her death had made, he told him- 
self — this new love was something different, and in 
no way disturbed her memory. 

But the tomb still stood in his way. 

" I am calm and tranquil," he wrote " Helen," " and 
but for a strange shadow of coming evil which haunts 
me I should be happy. That I am not supremely 
happy, even when I feel your dear love at my heart, 
terrifies me." 

Later he wrote, 

" You say that all depends on my own firmness. If 
this be so all is safe. Henceforward I am strong. 
But all does not depend, dear Helen, upon my firm- 
ness — all depends upon the sincerity of your love." 

A month later the skies of Providence shone bright- 
ly upon him. He returned there, was received by Mrs. 
Whitman as her affianced lover, delivered his brilliant 
lecture upon " The Poetic Principle " to a great throng 
of enthusiastic hearers, and won a promise from his 
lady to marry him at once and return with him to 
Fordham. He scribbled a line to Mother Clemm 
notifying her to be ready to receive him and his bride 
and went so far as to engage the services of a clergy- 
man, and to sign a marriage contract, in which Mrs. 
Whitman's property was made over to her mother. 

But — just at this point a note was slipped into the 
hand of "Helen," informing her that her lover had 
been seen drinking wine in the hotel. AAHien he called 
at her house soon afterward she received him sur- 



356 TEE DREAMER 

rounded by her family and though there were no 
signs of the wine, said " no " to him, emphatically — 
for the first time. 

He plead, but she remained firm — receiving his 
passionate words of remonstrance with sorrowful sil- 
ence, while her mother, impatient at his persistence, 
showed him the door. He prayed that she would at 
least speak one word to him in farewell. 

" What can I say ? " she questioned. 

"Say that you love me, Helen." 

" I love you ! '' 

With these words in his ears he was gone. As he 
passed out of the gate and out of her life he saw, or 
fancied he saw, through the veiled window, a white 
figure beckoning to him, but his steps were sternly 
set toward the opposite direction — his whole being 
crying within him, " Nevermore — nevermore ! " She 
had stretched out her spiritlike hands, but to draw 
them back again, in the fashion that fascinated and 
at the same time maddened him, once too often. The 
wave of romantic feeling which had borne him along 
since his vision of her in the garden suddenly sub- 
sided, leaving him disillusioned — cold. The reaction 
was so violent that instead of the magnetic attraction 
she had had for him he felt himself positively repelled 
by the thought of her unearthly beauty — her myste- 
rious eyes. 

He went straight to the depot and took the train 
just leaving, which would bear him back to the cot- 
tage among the cherry trees. 

Mother Clemm, expecting him to bring home a 
bride, had spent the day putting an extra touch of 
brightness upon the simple but already spotless, home. 
A cheerful fire was in the grate; branches of holly, 



THE DREAMER 357 

cedar and such other such bits of beauty as the woods 
ajfforded were everywhere about the house, and the 
Mother herself, in the snowiest of caps with the sheer- 
est of floating strings and a gallant look of welcome 
upon her sorrowful face, stood at the window and 
watched for the coming of the son that Heaven had 
given her, and the woman who was to take the place 
of the daughter that Heaven had taken away from 
her. Her oak-like nature had quailed at the thought — 
but it had withstood many a blast, it could weather 
one more, and after all, if "Eddie" were happy . 

In the far distance a figure emerged out of the 
gathering dusk — a man. Could it be Eddie? — 
Alone ? 

Yes ! It surely was he ! The carriage of the head — 
the military cloak — the walk — were unmistakable. 

But he was alone ! — She grew weak in the knees. — 
The shock of joy more nearly unnerved her than had 
the pain. She had braced herself to bear the pain. 

She recovered her composure and hastened to the 
door just in time to be folded into the arms of the 
figure in the cloak. 

" Helen ? " — she queried. 

"Is dead — to me," he answered, with his arms 
still about her. "We will have nothing more to say 
of her except this: Muddie, I have been in a dream 
from which, thank God, I am now awake. In the 
darkness of my loneliness — of my misery, of which 
you alone have the slightest conception, I saw a light 
which I fancied would lead me to the love for which 
my soul is starving — to the sympathy which is sweet- 
er even than love to the broken heart of a man. T 
followed it. I was deceived. It was no real light, 



358 THE DREAMER 

but a mere will o' the wisp bred in the dank tarn of 
despair." 

He released her to hang up the cloak in the little 
entrance hall, then taking her hand, which he raised 
to his lips, drew her into the sitting room. 

" Ah, but it is good to be at home again ! " he ex- 
claimed. 

His whole manner changed; a mighty weight seemed 
to roll from his shoulders as he stretched his legs 
before the fire. His old merry laugh — the laugh of 
Edgar Goodfellow — rang out as he told " Muddie '- 
of the success of his lecture, in Providence, — of the 
great audience and the applause. 

" Muddie," he cried, " my dream of The Stylus 
will come true yet! A few more such audiences and 
the money will be in sight! And let me add, I am 
done with literary women — henceforth literature her- 
self shall be my sole mistress. I am more than ever 
convinced that the profession of letters is the only one 
fit for a man of brain. There is little money in it, of 
course, but I'd rather be a poor-devil author earning 
a bare living than a king. Beyond a living, what does 
a man of brain want with money anyhow? — Muddie, 
did it ever strike you that all that is really valuable 
to a man of talent — especially to a poet — is absolute- 
ly unpurchasable ? — Love, fame, the dominion of in- 
tellect, the consciousness of power, the thrilling sense 
of beauty, the free air of Heaven, exercise of body 
and mind with the physical and moral health that 
these bring; — these, and such as these are really all a 
poet cares about. Then why should he mind what the 
world calls poverty?" 

"Why indeed?" echoed happy "Muddie." It was 
so delightful to have her son back at home, and in 



THE DREAMER 359 

this hopeful, contented frame, she would have agreed 
with him in almost any statement he chose to make. 

He gave her loving messages from " Annie " and 
told her in the bright, humorous way which was 
characteristic of Edgar Goodfellow, of many pleasant 
little incidents of his journey. One of the nights to 
look back upon and to gloat over in memory was this 
night by the fireside at Fordham cottage with the 
Mother — a night of calm and content under the home- 
roof after tempestuous wandering. 

A quiet, sweet Christmas they spent together — he 
reading, writing or talking over plans for new work, 
while she sat by with her sewing and Catalina dozed 
on the hearth. Part of every day (wrapped in the 
old cape) he walked in the pine wood or beside the 
ice-bound river, and for the first time since the fever- 
ish dream of new love had come to him he was able 
to visit the tomb of Virginia and to dwell with hap- 
piness, and with a clear conscience, upon her memory. 
During these days of serenity a ballad suggested by 
thoughts of her and his life with her in the lovely 
Valley of the Many-Colored Grass took form in his 
mind. It was no dirge-like song of the " dank tarn 
of Auber,^' but a song of a fair " kingdom by the sea " 
and in contrast to the sombre " Ulalume " he gave to 
the maiden in the new poem the pleasant sounding 
name of ^^ Annabel Lee." Out of these days too, came 
" the Bells " and the exquisite sonnet to his "more 
than Mother." 

One flash of the false light that had lured him 
reached The Dreamer at Fordliam. He held a letter 
addressed to him in the familiar handwriting of Helen 
Whitman long in his hand without opening it. This 
flame was burned out, he told himself — why rake its 



360 THE DREAMER 

cold ashes? Yet he felt that nothing that she could 
say would have power to disturb his new peace. Still 
the Mother, though she kept her own counsel, trembled 
for herself and for him as she was aware (without 
looking up from her sewing) that he had broken the 
seal. Some minutes of tense stillness passed — then, 

" Shall I read you her letter ? " he asked. 

" As you will." 

" Then I will ! — It is in verse and the place from 
which she dates it is, 

"Our Island of Dreams," wh^'ch she explains in a 
sub-heading is 

"By the foam 
" Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn " — a 
line which she has borrowed from Keats. This is 
what she writes : 

" Tell him I lingered alone on the shore. 
Where we parted, in sorrow, to meet nevermore; 
The night-wind blew cold on my desolate heart 
But colder those wild words of doom, 'Ye must part!' 

"O'er the dark, heaving waters, I sent forth a cry; 
Save the wail of those waters there came no reply. 
I longed, like a bird, o'er the billows to flee. 
Prom our lone island home and the moan of the sea: 

" Away, — far away — from the wild ocean shore, 
Where the waves ever murmur, 'No more, nevermore,' 
Where I wake, in the wild noon of midnight, to hear 
The lone song of the surges, so mournful and drear. 

" Where the clouds that now veil from us heaven's fair 
light. 
Their soft, silver lining turn forth on the night; 
When time shall the vapors of falsehood dispel 
He shall know if I loved him; but never how well." 



THE DREAMER 361 

Silence followed the reading of the poem-letter. 
Finally the mother asked^, 

"Will you go back?" 

He placed the letter upon the top of a pile in the 
same handwriting, tied them together with a bit of 
ribbon and laid them in a small drawer of his desk. 
Then, rising, he leaned over the back of " Muddle's " 
chair and lightly touching her seamed forehead with 
his lips replied, 

" Quoth the raven, nevermore! " 

Then took up a garland of evergreen which he had 
been making when the Mother came in with the mail, 
and set out in the direction of the churchyard with 
its "legended tomb." 



362 THE D,REAMER 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Back in Richmond! — The Richmond he loved best 
— Richmond full of sunshine and flowers and the 
sweet southern social life out of doors, in gardens and 
porches ; Richmond in summertime ! 

In spite of the changes his observant eye marked as 
he rattled over the cobblestones toward the " Swan 
Tavern/' on Broad and Ninth Streets, he almost felt 
that he was back in boyhood. It was just such a day, 
just this time of year, that — as a lad of eleven — he 
had seen Richmond first after his five years absence 
in England. 

How good it was to be back upon the sacred soil! 
How sweet the air was, and how beautiful were the 
roses ! When before, had he seen a magnolia tree in 
bloom ? — with its dense shade, its dark green shin- 
ing foliage, and its snow-white blossoms. Was there 
anything in the world so sweet as its odor, combined 
with that of the roses and the other flowers that filled 
the gardens? It was worth coming all the way from 
New York just to see and to smell them. 

He caught glimpses of one or two familiar figures as 
he drove along. How impatient he was to see his old 
friends — everybody — white and colored, old and 
young, masculine and feminine. He could^ hardly 
wait to get to the tavern, remove the dust of travel 
and sally forth upon the round of visits he intended 
to make. His spirits went up — and up, and finally 
it was Edgar Goodfellow in the flesh who stepped 
jauntily from the door of " Swan Tavern,'' arrayed for 
hot-weather calling. In spite of the summer tempera- 



THE DREAMER 363 

ture, he looked the personification of coolness and com- 
fort. The taste of prosperity his lectures had brought 
him was evident in his modest but spruce apparel. 
He had discarded the habitual black cloth for a coat 
and trousers of white linen (exquisitely laundered by 
Mother Clemm's capable and loving hands) which he 
wore with a black velvet vest for which he had also 
to thank the Mother and her skilled needle. A broad- 
brimmed Panama hat shaded his pale features and 
the grey eyes, which glowed with happiness. As 
with proudly carried head and quick, easy gait, he 
bore westward up Broad Street, no single person 
passed him that did not turn to look with admiration 
upon the handsome, distinguished stranger, and to 
mentally ask "Who is he?'' 

It so happened that Jack Mackenzie was the first 
acquaintance he met. 

"Edgar,'' he said, as their hands joined in affec- 
tionate grasp, "Do you remember once, years ago, I 
met you in the street and you said you were going to 
look for the end of the rainbow? Well, you look as 
if you had found it ! " 

" I have," was the reply. " An hour ago. It was 
here in Richmond all the time and I didn't know it, 
and like a poor fool, have been wandering the world 
over in a vain search for it. The trouble is, I was 
looking for the wrong thing. I was looking for fame 
and fortune, thought of which blinded my eyes to 
something far better — scenes and friendships of lang 
syne. Jack — " he continued, as — arm in arm — the 
two friends made their way up the street. "Jack, life 
is a great schoolmaster, but why does it take so long 
to drub any sense into these blockheads of ours ? " 

"Damned if I know," replied his companion, who 



364 THE DREAMER 

was more truthful always than either poetic or philo- 
sophic, " but if you mean that you've decided to come 
back to Eichmond to live, I'm mighty^ glad to hear it." 

" That's what I mean. I came only for a visit and 
to lecture, but made up my mind on the way from the 
depot to come for good as soon as I can arrange to do 
so. I think it was a magnolia tree in bloom — the 
first I had seen in many a year — that decided me." 

"Well, all of your old friends will be glad to have 
you back; there's one in particular that I might men- 
tion. Do you remember Elmira Eoyster? She's a 
comely widow now, with a comfortable fortune, and 
she's always had a lingering fondness for you. I ad- 
vise you to hunt her up." 

The Dreamer's face clouded. 

" Women are angels. Jack," he said. " They are 
the salt that will save this world, if it is to be saved, 
and for poor sinners like me there would be simply 
no hope in either this world or the next but for them; 
but they will have no more part in my life, save as 
friends. A true friend of mine, however, I believe 
Myra is. I saw her during my brief visit here last fall. 
— Ah, Eob ! my boy ! Howdy ! " 

The two friends had turned into Sixth Street and 
as they drew near the corner of Sixth and Grace, al- 
most ran into Eob Stanard — now a prominent lawyer 
and one of the leading gentlemen of the town. 

" Eddie Poe, as I'm alive ! " he exclaimed, with a 
hearty hand-clasp. " My, my, what a pleasure ! I'm 
on my way home to dinner, boys. Come in, both of 
you and take pot-luck with us. My wife will be de- 
lighted to see you ! " 

The invitation was accepted as naturally as it was 
given, and the three mounted together the steps of the 



THE DREAMER 365 

beautiful house and were received in the charmingly 
homelike drawingroom opening from the wide hall, 
by Eob's wife, a Kentucky belle who had stepped 
gracefully into her place as mistress of one of the 
notable homes in Virginians capital. As she gave her 
jewelled hand to Edgar Poe her handsome black eyes 
sparkled with pleasure. She was not only sincerely 
glad to receive the friend of her husband's boyhood, 
but keen appreciation of intellectual gifts made her 
feel that to know him was a distinction. Some of the 
servants who had known "Marse Eddie" in the old 
days were still of the household — having come to 
Eobert Stanard as part of his father's estate — and 
they were to their intense gratification, pleasantly 
greeted by the visitor. 

That evening — and many subsequent evenings — 
The Dreamer spent at " Duncan Lodge " with the 
Mackenzies and their friends. A series of sunlit days 
followed — days of lingering in Eob Sully's studio or 
in the familiar office of The Southern Literary Mes- 
senger where the editor, Mr. John E. Thompson — 
himself a poet — gave him a warm welcome always, 
and gladly accepted and published in The Messenger 
anything the famous former editor would let him 
have ; days of wandering in the woods or by the tumbl- 
ing river he had loved as a lad; days of searching 
out old haunts and making new ones. 

And everywhere he found welcome. Delightful lit- 
tle parties were given in his honor, when in return for 
the courtesies paid him he charmed the company by 
reciting " The Eaven " as he alone could recite it. 
His lectures upon "The Poetic Principle" and "The 
Philosophy of Composition," and his readings in thd 
assembly rooms of the Exchange Hotel, drew the elite 



366 THE DREAMER 

of the city, who sat spellbound while he, erect and 
still and pale as a statue, filled their ears with 
the music of his voice, and their souls with wonder 
at the brilliancy of his thought and words. Subscrip- 
tions to TJie Stylus poured in. At last, this dream of 
his life seemed an assured fact. 

One door — one only in all the town did not swing 
wide to receive him. The closed portal of the man- 
sion of which he had been the proud young master, 
still said to him " Nevermore '' — and he always had 
a creepy sensation when he passed it, which even the 
sight of the flower-garden he had loved, in fullest 
bloom, did not overcome. 

The golden days ran into golden weeks and the 
weeks into months, and still Edgar Poe was making 
holiday in Eichmond — the first holiday he had had 
since, as a youth of seventeen he had quarrelled with 
John Allan and gone forth to the battle of life. In 
the long, long battle since then there had been more 
of joy than they knew who looking on had seen the 
toil and the defeat and the despair, but from whose 
eyes the exaltation he had felt in the act of creation 
or in the contemplation of the works of nature, and 
the happiness he found in his frugal home, were 
hidden. But, as has been said, there had been no 
holiday, until now when he had come back to Eich- 
mond an older and a sadder and a more experienced 
Edgar Poe — an Edgar Poe upon whom the Silence 
and the Solitude had fallen and had left shaken — 
broken. 

Yet that personal identity upon the mystery of 
which he liked to ponder — the unquenchable, immor- 
tal ego was there; and it was, for all the outward and 
inward changes, the same Edgar Poe, with his two 



THE DRBAMER 367 

natures — Dreamer and Goodf ellow — alternately domi- 
nating him, who had come back to find the real end 
of the rainbow in revisiting old scenes, renewing old 
friendships, awakening old memories — and had paused 
to make holiday. 

Even in these golden days there were occasional 
falls, for the cup of kindness was everywhere and in 
his blood was the same old strain which made mad- 
ness for him in the single glass — the single drop, 
almost; and in spite of all the great schoolmaster, 
Life, had taught him, there was in liis will the same 
old element of weakness. Had it been otherwise he 
had not been Edgar Poe. At times, too, the blue devils 
raised their heads. Had it been otherwise he had not 
been Edgar Poe. 

But on the whole the holiday was a bright dream of 
Paradise regained at a time when more than ever 
before his feet had seemed to march only to the cadence 
of the old, sad word, Nevermore. 

Two sacred pilgrimages he made early in this holi- 
day — to the two shrines of his romantic boyhood — 
to Shockoe Cemetery, where he not only visited 
" Helenas " tomb, but laid a wreath upon the grave of 
Frances Allan — his little foster mother, and to the 
churchyard on the hill. The white steeple still slept 
serenely in the blue atmosphere above the church and, 
as of yore, the bell called in deep, sweet tones to 
prayer. But how the churchyard had filled since he 
saw it last! Graves, graves everywhere. It was ap- 
palling ! He stepped between the graves, old and new, 
stooping to read the' inscriptions upon the slabs. So 
many that he remembered as merry boys and girls 
and hale men and women still in their prime — could 
they really be dead? — gone forever from the scenes 



368 THE DREAMER 

which had known them and of which they seemed an 
integral part? Oh, mystery of mysteries, how was it 
possible? — Yet here were their names plainly writ- 
ten upon the marbles ! The church builded by men'q 
hands, the trees planted by men's hands, the monu- 
ments fashioned by men's hands remained, but the 
living, breathing men, where were they? Could it be 
that God's highest creation was a, more perishable 
thing than the lifeless work of its own hand? His 
spirit cried out within him against such a thought. 
;N'o, it could not be ! Gone from earth, or holden from 
mortal vision they assuredly were — • departed — but 
dead? No! 

Finally he came to the grave beside the wall. No 
marble tomb told the passer-by that there lay the body 
of Elizabeth Poe. Yet, whiit matter? — Was her 
sleep the less peaceful? Was her tired spirit the less 
free? — If in its flight it should visit this spot where 
it had laid the burden of the body down, surely it 
would find, for all there was no carven stone to mark 
it, a most sweet spot. The greenest of grass, and 
clover with blossoms white and red, waved over it^ — 
the summer breeze rippling through them with pleas- 
ant sound, — and the tall trees hung a green canopy 
between it and the midday sun. 

As he laid his offering of roses among the clover 
blooms and turned to go away the bell in the steeple 
began to toll. How the past came back ! — He stood 
with uncovered and bowed head and counted the 
strokes. Suddenly, there wai^ a sound of horses tramp- 
ing in the street below the wall. Then through the 
gate and down the walk it came — the solemn proces- 
sion. 

He waited until the last of the mourners had passed 



TEE DREAMER 369 

into the church, then followed, and as the bell stopped 
tolling and the organ began to play the familiar, mov- 
ing chant, he passed in and took a seat near the door. 
Whose funeral service he was attending he knew notr— 
but he was back in childhood, and it was beautiful to 
him to hear once more, in this very church, the words 
of spoken music and the old familiar hymns he had 
heard that day when his infant heart had been filled 
with a beautiful sorrow that was not pain. 

More than one pair of eyes turned to see the owner 
of the fine tenor voice that joined in the singing of 
the hymns, and resting for a moment upon thei dark, 
uplifted eyes of Edgar Poe, caught a glimpse of some- 
thing not of this earth. 

As he left the church and churchyard, he noted 
many changes in its immediate neighborhood but the 
only one upon which his eye lingered was a smug 
brick house of commodious proportions and genteel 
aspect. A pleasant green yard afforded space for a 
few trees and flowers. A dignified and prosperous, but 
not in the least romantic house it was. A house with 
no rambling wings giving opportunities for winding 
passageways and odd nooks and corners; no imex- 
pected closets where skeletons might be in hiding, or 
duslry stairways to creak in the dead of night, or upon 
which, even by day, one was almost certain he caught 
a glimpse of a shadowy figure flying before him as 
he groped his way up or down them. A house with 
no mysteries — just the house in which one might 
have expected to find Elmira Royster who, as the 
Widow Shelton, the prudent housewife and good man- 
ager of a prosperous estate, was simply the frank, 
clear-eyed girl he had known, grown older. 

He would call upon Elmira sometime, but not now 



370 THE DREAMER 

— not today — some other day, when some other mood 
was upon him. 

And he did call, not once, but frequently Some- 
how, there were times when of all his friends, Elmira 
rested him most. The very absence of the mysteri- 
ous — the romantic — in her, was refreshing to him. 
And so was her sincere, yet not too intense affection 
for him — an affection which she did not make the 
slightest pretense toward hiding and which had re- 
mained unshaken and unaltered through all the 
changes since she had told him he was the nicest boy 
in town and had wept upon his shoulder at the thought 
of his going to the University. He felt when with 
her, indeed, that in spite of all the banging and bat- 
tering he had had from Life — in spite of all he had 
learned from experiences bitter and sweet — in spite 
of all the dreams he had dreamed — he was the same 
Edgar and she the same Myra, with something clear 
and simple in her make-up upon which his bruised, 
desolate spirit could rest — though she understood him 
not the least in the world. 

The first time he called she was about to start to 
church and though she frankly made him feel how 
welcome he was, she excused herself and bade him 
come again when his visit would not interfere with 
her religious duties. He liked her for that too — he 
that had so often been tempted and fallen, thoroughly 
admired, in others, the strength which could pursue 
the even tenor of the path of duty — turning neither 
to the right nor to the left. There was something sus- 
taining about such conscientiousness. It was not fas- 
cinating, but it was better, it was bracing. He felt 



THE DREAMER 371 

that the friendship — the companionship — of such a 
woman was a thing to help a man be strong. 

And what more natural than that in coming back to 
Richmond^ — back to old friends — old scenes — old 
dreams — he should come back to Myra^ who (for all 
she was known as the Widow Shelton, and was mis- 
tress of the smug house on shady Grace Street, oppo- 
site St. Jolin's) seemed to him to have been waiting 
for him ever since the moonlii, night when she sat in 
her white muslin dress, with the jessamine bloom 
in her fair hair, under the roses, and they told each 
other their youthful love. 

During his three months holiday in Richmond, many 
moonlit nights found him sitting beside Myra who 
still wore filmy white dresses and in whose hair was 
often a jessamine blossom — the very same it seemed 
to him, as its tropic perfume enveloped him and bore 
him back, as if by magic, to the night of his early 
dream. 

He wrote Mother Clemm of his visits to his old 
sweetheart and her unchanged love for him, adding, 

" And I cannot help loving her in return." 

And Elmira was interested in The Stijlus — in her 
wholesome, practical way. She believed in The Stylus. 
She was not in the least literary, but she believed that 
such a venture would pay — believed that, with her 
means and business ability and his fame and knowl- 
edge of letters, they could make it pay. 

There was no tantalizing uncertainty about Myra. 
Her promise to become his wife was promptly, frank- 
ly given, and also her consent to have the wedding as 
soon as possible. The contract, which in accordance 
with his wish secured her property to herself and her 



372 THE DREAMER 

little son, so that she could only use the income, was 
duly signed and sealed. The wedding ring was bought. 

With visions of a new start in life, of which there 
were many happy years in store for him (why not? — 
He was only forty!) The Dreamer set out on his way 
back to Fordham to settle up his affairs and bring 
Mother Clemm to Eichmond to witness his marriage 
and to take up her abode with him and his bride, in 
the brick house on the hill. He had been upon a holi- 
day, but he carried with him a goodly sum of money 
realized from his lectures, and a long list of sub- 
scribers to The Stylus. Surely, Fortune had never 
shown him a more smiling face ! 

*********** 

Baltimore ! — 

"Why did his way lie through Baltimore? Balti- 
more, with its memories of A^irginia — Baltimore 
where he had come up out of the grave to the heaven 
of her love, and where had been iirst constructed the 
most beautiful of all his dreams — the dream of the 
Valley of the Many-Colored Grass, in which he and 
she and the Mother had lived for each other only! 

In Baltimore again he found his way stopped by 
the vision of "a legended tomb." It was paralyzing! 
He could go no further upon his journey, but lingered 
in Baltimore, wandering the streets like one bereft. 

The words — the prophetic words — of his own poem 
^^ To One in Paradise," haunted him : 

" A voice from out the future cries, 
*0n! on! ' But o'er the Past 
(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies 
Mute, motionless, aghast! " 



THE DREAMER 373 

And again, the words of his "Bridal Ballad^' — 
more prophetic still: 

"Would to God I could awaken! 

For I dream I know not how; 
And my soul is sorely shaken 
Lest an evil step he taken, — 
Lest the dead who is forsaken 

May not be happy now." 

And that merciless other self, his accusing Con- 
science, arose, and with whisper louder and more ter- 
rible than ever before, upbraided him — reminding him 
of the vow he had made his wife upon her bed of 
death. 

Alas, the vow! — that solemn, sacred vow! How 
could he have so utterly forgotten it? How plainly 
he could see her lying upon the snowy pillow — her 
face not much less white — her trustful eyes on his 
eyes as he knelt by her side and swore that he would 
never bind himself in marriage to another — invoking 
from Heaven a terrible curse upon his soul if he 
should ever prove traitorous to his oath. 

Alas, where had been his will that he had so soon 
forgotten his vow? How he despised himself for his 
weakness — he that had boasted in the words of old 
Joseph Glanvil, until he had almost made them his 
own words: 

" 'Man doth not yield himself to the angels nor 
unto death utterly, save only through the weakness of 
his will/" 

Hours on hours he wandered the streets of the city 
whose every paving stone seemed to speak to him of 
his Virginia — the city where he had walked with her 



374 THE DREAMER 

— where he had first spoken of love to her and' heard 
her sweet confession — where^ in the holy church, the 
beautiful words of the old, old rite had made them one. 
All day he wandered, and all night — driven, cruel- 
ly driven — by the upbraiding whisper in his ear, 
while before him still he saw her white face with the 
soft eyes looking out — it seemed to him in reproach. 

Finally the longing which had come upon him in 
Providence — the longing for the peace of the grave 
and reunion, in death, with Virginia, was strong upon 
him again — pressed him hard — mastered him. 

It was sometime in the early morning that he swal- 
lowed the draught — the draught that would free his 
spirit, that would enable him to lay down the burden 
of his body and to fly from the steps that dogged his 
steps — from the voice that whispered upbraidings. 
He would lay his body down by the side of her body 
in the "legended tomb" while his spirit would fly to 
join her spirit in that far Aidenn where they would be 
happy together forever. 

As he fell asleep he murmured (again quoting him- 
self) : 

" And neither the angels in heaven above, 
Nor the demons down under the sea, 
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul 
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee." 

When he opened his wondering eyes upon the white 
walls of the hospital he was feeble and weak in his 
limbs as an infant, but his brain was unclouded. 
Gentle hands ministered to him and a woman's voice 
read him spirit-soothing words from the Gospel of 
St. John. But the draught had done its work. He 



THE DREAMER 375 

lingered some days and then, on Sunday morning, 
the seventh day of October of the year 1849, his spirit 
took its flight. His last words were a prayer : 

" Lord, have mercy on my poor soul! " 

Many were the friends who rose up to comfort the 
stricken mother and who hastened to bring rosemary 
to the poet's grave. But there was one whom he had 
believed to be his friend — a big man whose big brain 
he had admired — in whose furtive eye was an unholy 
glee, about whose thick lips played a smile which 
slightly revealed his fang-like teeth. To him was en- 
trusted the part of literary executor — it had been The 
Dreamer's own request. In his power it would lie to 
give to the world his own account of this man who 
had said he was no poet and had distanced him in the 
race for a woman's favor. 

The day was at hand when Eufus Griswold would 
have his full revenge upon the fair fame of Edgar 
the Dreamer. 
*********** 

"Out — out are the lights — out all! 

And, over each quivering form. 
The curtain, a funeral pall. 

Comes down with the rush of a storm; 
And the angels, all pallid and wan. 

Uprising, unveiling, aflfirm 
That the play is the tragedy, * Man,' 

And its hero the Conqueror Worm." 



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